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John Smedley Steps Down As CEO Of Daybreak Studios
- Thread starter BlackBuzzard
- Start date
BUNTING1243
Banned
If I had to put up with what he's had to put up with, I'd probably take a break too.
I'll be so upset if that never comes to be. I hate most MMOs, but that one...
Oh, that one looked good.
BlackBuzzard
Banned
Yeah all because of a bunch of lil shits.
Things aren't looking good for Everquest Next because of Smedley.
BizzyBum
Member
I'll never forgive him for what he did to SWG.
What they were promising sounds good, but they barely showed anything from that game. I can't remember the last time we even got info from it. Not looking good.
SnipeyMcGee
Member
Hope he lands in a good spot, he's had a rough time on the job as of late. Also hope EQ Next doesn't suffer from this.
CertifiedFP
Member
Let's be honest, even without the cyberattacks this was inevitable, SOE/Daybreak has been going downhill ever since the disastrous reception to Planetside 2's launch, and Sony deciding to sell them off was but the crescendo to a lot of bad things to come for SOE/DB as a result of how they've been performing as a studio.
The Landmark beta was good though. It was like a highly detailed version of Minecraft.
BlackBuzzard
Banned
Well with what they did to him i bet its pretty hard to ignore it all, when they decide to give only a 2 year jail sentence.
well they did call in a bomb threat to ground his plane
Wow. Hope this is good for him (and us).
I mean, personal things aside which are most important, I'm on a gaming forum, so .. Smedley, you're my last hope for EQ Hype.
I can only return to EQ 1 about 10-15 more times and start over, or EQ 2 about 5 more times and start over..... I really needed EQ Next to work!
I mean, personal things aside which are most important, I'm on a gaming forum, so .. Smedley, you're my last hope for EQ Hype.
I can only return to EQ 1 about 10-15 more times and start over, or EQ 2 about 5 more times and start over..... I really needed EQ Next to work!
This just adds to a list of things Daybreak has had to endure since being converted and downsized from Sony Online Entertainment.
SOE was pretty much a great company with a lot of heart, and then got a lot of that heart ripped out of it when it was sold off.
CountAntonius
Member
H1Z1 has sold well over a million copies and it still one of the best sellers on Steam with a good sized community and steam marketplace support bringing in more money. I don't think they are in that bad of a place right now.
chrisPjelly
Member
Yeesh... I feel reaally bad for him. Needless to say, I hope he knows what he's doing in dealing with the bastard scum. It better not consume his entire life :/
I get that and I absolutely don't blame him for any of his reactions, but making a big deal about it is A) doing exactly what the punks wanted, and B) making yourself a bigger target.
Edit: Of course he still should've gone to the police. Maybe just hold back on some of the tweets, Reddit comments, etc.
While that could be code for "fired". If he was a programmer, artist or games designer originally, with everything that's been going on, maybe he's after a less publicly facing position. It's not necessarily a bad thing.
I still have no clue WTF LizardSquad had against this guy. Maybe he nerfed their Everquest class or something equally completely inconsequential.
If that's the only LizardSquad thing you've heard about concerning this guy, then I get what you're saying. But they've been trolling him alot more than just grounding his plane and I'm not just talking about the dead dad thing. I'm talking credit score, identity theft type stuff.
Recidivus Crimen
Member
Seems like hes been through a bit and is just taking a break for a while. Dont blame the guy. I wonder what he'll do when he comes back though.
CertifiedFP
Member
Alright, one dart that sticks among a massive wall of duds. Planetside 2 took a lot of heat and is consistently bleeding players on PC (Don't know how it's doing on PS4, but I hope to god DB doesn't pull a reverse-Valve and end up only giving the PS4 version proper support if it does better), Everquest Next has been in development hell, and Wizardry Online's western release got shut down within a year of servers opening - And does it not say enough that even in the face of H1Z1's million sales, Sony still didn't see it as worthwhile to keep SOE on board?
(Also, just to note, this news is actually from about ten days ago, seems VentureBeat is late on this story.)
CountAntonius
Member
They were a massive studio that worked on games better suited for PC. Sony selling them made sense as they were focusing on their console.
Matrix XII
Member
Yes, I must agree with you.
I've been excited for Everquest Next for some time now. If that were not to be realized, it would be a shame indeed.
CountAntonius
Member
I have a feeling that game is going to end up some Co Op action RPG with Instanced player housing. Something like Minecraft. An MMO on that scale can destroy the studio if it flops and I just don't see them risking it.
Amazing folks let him in the door after Vanguard.
Probably get beaten, but..you're thinking of McQuaid. Brad McQuaid, who was let back in the door many years later.. but then left again is last I heard.
As for Smedley, he wasn't perfect, but he was one of the original 3. Someone can check my history, but I've been following them since release and have two EQ Lore/Anniversary whatever books.
So, at least he was a name people knew, .. you know like as long as Wal-Mart is owned by a Walton, you figure it'll stay true to the original image.
You right
One of the problems with MMORPGs is they let folks hang around with past glories sticking to out dated designs and listening to the vocal minority.
Smedley announces SOE is no more, becomes Daybreak Game Company
He also has some major prior screw ups like Star Wars Galaxies. If the guy can lie this blatantly and mess up this often, I am not surprised that he has picked up a few enemies.
Smedley made this statement around 10 days before laying off 140 developers, removing GM support in Everquest 1 and 2, losing the Planetside 2 creative director, firing David Georgeson - the director of Everquest Next (the guy who thought up all of those hype ideas) and even cutting ties with Storybricks, an incredible hyped up dynamic story/quest AI system feature of Everquest Next (this led to the Storybricks company shutting down).
He also has some major prior screw ups like Star Wars Galaxies. If the guy can lie this blatantly and mess up this often, I am not surprised that he has picked up a few enemies.
Mad Season
Banned
his time was up TBH
remember Vanguard Saga of Heroes, yeah...
They had a alright run with SWG and the first Everquest. Other than that they will be remember as the pioneers of MMORPGs, who could not make an actual decent MMORPG, ever...
Oof, yeah, EQN was already in trouble then. Storybricks was going to be the heart of the game.
Wow. It's sounding to me like this company and all of it's games are heading to their death beds. EQ1 did hold out long though, to be honest.
CertifiedFP
Member
Amen, like I've been saying, the past few months, if not years, for SOE/DB have been a massive case of, well...
The above, in action.
H1Z1 is ultimately a good thing for DB, yes, but it's a good thing being weighed down by a million and one anvils and albatrosses that they've accumulated in the past few years.
(And seriously, if PlanetSide 2's failure wasn't a sign of things to come, then I don't know what is.)
CertifiedFP
Member
Looking at stats, the game has been consistently been bleeding players every month, even with the slight bump Hossin's release gave it last year. Then look on GAF, the only Planetside 2 discussion is about the PS4 version, with the PC release having virtually Nil mindshare. General public opinion about it everywhere outside of the hardcore clan communities also agrees that Planetside 2 on PC has been a failure.
A game doesn't need to be a Dust 514-scale flop to be a failure, mind. But ultimately, I'd say Planetside 2 didn't achieve, and likely won't ever achieve what Daybreak was hoping it would. It simply hasn't left a mark.
EASTC0AST_GH05T
Member
Everquest Next please still release and not tank.
ieptbarakat
Member
This still burns for me, I lost so many online friends from those updates I pretty much have longterm anxiety over it.
My username is the main character name I had, so yeah.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Jesus... I didn't know about their cutting ties with Storybricks. That was supposed to be a defining feature of the game...
Have they shown anything of EQ Next since David Georgeson got the boot? I don't know much about that guy, but he seemed pretty cool.
This.
Though he didn't deserve what he dealt with, he poked the hornets nest one too many times leading to that stuff, then he poorly directed that studio nearly into oblivion. He allowed Higby and crew to completely Piss all over planetside 2 and handled that situation all wrong. H1Z1 isn't that great of a game and they lucked out making a slightly less buggy version of of a mod pack, everquest seems to be in development hell, and then there's the swg things. DB should count their blessings he's gone, for now. Let's see if they can turn it all around.
ISee
Member
Are you talking about the nge? Because that was on lucasarts.