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#1
11-07-2011, 01:04 PM
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Why would Sony acquire itself?
Brad McQuaid interview excerpt: Question: I thought 989 was almost exclusively a sports game company? Had they done anything else? I never really understood how you guys got "in" with that crowd. At the time, 989 (then Sony Interactive Studios America) was split into two main studios, sports and non-sports. John Smedley was the Executive Producer (and later Director of Development) of the non-sports studio. Both studios worked primarily on Playstation 1 (and later Playstation 2) games. But John was heavily into online PC games (mostly pay-for-play games like Cyberstrike). He also really wanted to work on some, so he started development of Tanarus (a non-persistent online tank warfare game) as sort of an experiement and technology proving ground. Some time later he felt he was in a position to get additional funding and start an online RPG, and the EverQuest project was approved (not that it had that name yet (Steve Clover named EQ), nor even a team). He also didn't really have a lot of PC-oriented developers, much less RPG-types, so he looked around for local developers. He saw the WarWizard 2 demo Steve, I, Kevin Burns, and Bill Trost had put together. He then noted that Milo Cooper (then at 989, working on the Gameday series) had done the art for WarWizard 1, and talked with him about us. So John hired Steve and I to being work on EQ, and I was later able to bring on board Kevin, Bill, and many others. The online games group grew and grew until we pretty much were our own studio in addition to the sports and non-sports studio. But then when PS/2 was announced, 989 management needed to expand to keep developing PS/1 titles and expand to the new platform, and so we (the online studio) spun off into our own company (Verant Interactive). We'd by then started work on many titles (the game that would become SW:G, EQ expansions, Planetside, Sovereign, etc.), and found another Sony company (Sony Online Entertainment) to fund those titles. Even later, after EQ launched and was extremely successful, SOE ended up buying Verant, and the rest is history. Question: If meself recalls correctly, methinks it went, "Red Eye Entertainment" > "989 Studios" > "Verant Interactive". The first company was Sony Interactive Studios, which was under SCEA (Sony Computer Entertanment America). Later, this company changed names to 989 Studios. Even later, btw, after we were gone, 989 Studios changed it's name to just SCEA, but kept 989 Sports as a 'brand'. SCEA is still in San Diego (and many other locations) making PS/2 games. When it was 989 Studios, we left the company and founded Verant Interactive. For a very short time, Verant was RedEye, but there was a name conflict, so we went to Verant. Verant Interactive, an independent company, was then later purchased by Sony Online Entertainment (a totally different Sony entity). SOE is under Sony Digital which is under Sony Pictures. The Verant name then faded away and now they are simply SOE. Complicated? Yeah, I can barely keep it straight. So no...it was not always Sony. Now you know the rest of the story.
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#2
11-07-2011, 12:55 PM
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Still sounds like an opinion stated as a fact. Your argument holds no water.
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#4
11-07-2011, 01:11 PM
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#5
11-07-2011, 01:24 PM
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So your statment is false, It might not be removed, but it being classic will have nothing to do with it. It would be up to the devs to decide whether its too powerful or game changing. | |||
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#6
11-07-2011, 01:33 PM
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However at the same time he is putting forth the argument that this server has taken at least one item (hoop) that was classic, reasonably rechargeable, and useful and "fixed" it an attempt avoid imbalancing end game raid encounters. He would like to see this applied to other items which are being used daily by classes that otherwise should be required to either go without or rely on other classes to fill the niche. Examples: Clerics with instant invis rings v. single charge potions. Magicians with instant root nets v. earth pets. These classes do not innately have these abilities and it reduces reliance on other classes which was the very foundation of EQ. Affecting a change to remove all recharging especially on Locket of Escape would irreversibly damage the Plane of Mischief scene unless it is coded to allow binding of other players which would also be extremely damaging. | |||
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#7
11-07-2011, 01:23 PM
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Well... no.. What hasbinbad was calling Sony was a console-based sports game company (989 studios). Verant was not part of that. I think that console-based sports games are clearly distinctive from computer-based MMORPGs. That's a fact I can prove, not an opinion.
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Last edited by Samoht; 11-07-2011 at 01:25 PM..
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#8
11-07-2011, 01:35 PM
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Sony Owned 989 which had a sports and non-sports departments. "At the time, 989 (then Sony Interactive Studios America) was split into two main studios, sports and non-sports" The fact remains that you were attempting to link the fact that VI wasnt the team that made the changes to item recharges, it was SoE. When in fact one of the biggest players in everquest was in control of everquest from inception until way past the change to item recharging. Spfft | |||
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#9
11-07-2011, 01:26 PM
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What's false about my statement? It's not only 100% truth, but backed up by your own posts.
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#10
11-07-2011, 01:45 PM
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