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John Smedley Steps Down As CEO Of Daybreak Studios

sangreal

Member
I couldn't stand this guy back when I actually played SoE games. I think they will be better off without him. Hopefully his new role is greatly diminished. That said, the Lizard Squad stuff is fucked up and I feel bad for him
 

mnannola

Member
If he needed to be sacrificed in order to get EQNext going the way they pitched it a few years ago, then so be it.

Lots of people in here saying Planetside 2 failed. Didn't it make a profit?

For what it's worth, Planetside 2 is the most ambitious FPS game in the past 5 years. Have to give Smed some credit for that.
 
I'll be so upset if that never comes to be. I hate most MMOs, but that one...

Oh, that one looked good.

Everquest Next is the one MMO I've ever gotten legitimately, enthusiastically excited for.

I've wanted it so bad for so long. I hope it still comes out. And I hope it's excellent. And popular. Landmark didn't take off like I hoped.
 

Walpurgis

Banned
Everquest Next is the one MMO I've ever gotten legitimately, enthusiastically excited for.

I've wanted it so bad for so long. I hope it still comes out. And I hope it's excellent. And popular. Landmark didn't take off like I hoped.
That's because they haven't even released Landmark yet. It's really insane since it has been in beta for like a year and a half. I was hoping it would be a Minecraft killer but now I am just hoping that it will release before I die.
 
D

Deleted member 471617

Unconfirmed Member
Earlier this month, Kivimaki was convicted of more than 50,000 counts of computer-related crimes in Finland, but he didn’t receive any jail time, only a two-year commuted sentence.

WTF??? 50,000 counts and all he got was a two year commuted sentence? Are you fucking kidding me???? *SMH*
 

KPJZKC

Member
Has there even been a peep about EQ Next since Daybreak was acquired/name changed? I was under the impression that people had sort of accepted that it wasn't going to survive...
 
Amen, like I've been saying, the past few months, if not years, for SOE/DB have been a massive case of, well...

nothing_to_see_here_naked_gun.gif


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.)
Planetside 2 failure? What are you talking about? Planetside 2 has been profitable for months now.
 

Jigorath

Banned
This guy has gotten so much hate from assholes over the years, he's a real champ for putting up with it all. Best of luck to whatever he wants to do.
 

kinoki

Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.
I guess that when you have to put up with narrowminded hateful, spiteful people all day you just realize there are more important things in life and move on.
 

Carcetti

Member
Planetside 2 failure? What are you talking about? Planetside 2 has been profitable for months now.

What worries me about PS2 while I enjoy playing it a lot these days, is that I get the impression it's not going to be improve much in the future. Sure it got tons of Extremely expensive player made helmets but not exactly holding my breath on the new vehicle etc front. Maybe I'm wrong but the layoffs arent' exactly making me confident about the days to come.
 

Circinus

Member
It might be a good thing for the company, quite frankly.

What he had to put through sucks though..

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.

Sony Corporation is a conglomerate. By definition, they don't focus on just one thing.


I don't think they would have sold SOE if it was a highly profitable company. I mean, from a business point of view, it's only a good thing to be in multiple profitable markets within the video game segment and to not put all you eggs in one basket (console).

They wouldn't have been founded and be part of Sony for 17 years if Sony just wanted focus on console games. SOE has always been mostly autonomous from SCE.

I think SOE just wasn't a financially very healthy company in its later years. John Smedley himself said a couple of months ago that PlanetSide 2 only started operating on a profitable day-to-day basis since a couple of weeks ago when he said that. (meaning they were losing money just with server costs, maintenance and support after launch).
 

lazygecko

Member
Sounds like it was the Twitter incident specifically which caused him to step down?

Impulsive tweets claims yet another victim.
 

blastprocessor

The Amiga Brotherhood
They are basically saying Lizard Squad forced him out. This is not good and we shouldn't allow this to happen otherwise they win.
 

Azzurri

Member
Amazing folks let him in the door after Vanguard.

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...

You guys are thinking of Brad McQuaid, different person. There is an article about the huge failure of Vanguard which lead SoE taking it over.
 

lazygecko

Member
Vanguard survived an absurd amount of time under SoE's wing as well. I think it was only shut down as late as 2 years ago or something. In the media it was made to look like a much bigger failure than games like Warhammer Online or that sci-fi one from Richard Garriot (Can't remember the name. Some latin phrase?) which didn't live nearly as long.
 

espher

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.

Most MMOs bleed players over time, though it will be interesting to see where (if) Planetside 2 plateaus.

Even as someone who plays the game nightly, and enjoys it, I do think they overpromised and underdelivered, and I would have been happier w/ Planetside HD than the Planetside 2 we have now.
 

Atrophis

Member
Vanguard survived an absurd amount of time under SoE's wing as well. I think it was only shut down as late as 2 years ago or something. In the media it was made to look like a much bigger failure than games like Warhammer Online or that sci-fi one from Richard Garriot (Can't remember the name. Some latin phrase?) which didn't live nearly as long.

Tabula Rasa. What a massive piece of shit. Seems like Garriots latest crowdfunded MMO is utter trash too. Who'd have thunk it huh?
 

Apdiddy

Member
I almost wonder if Smedley is going to use his stepping down as CEO in his lawsuit against individual members of Lizard Squad.

He should sue them for everything they (aren't) worth. Emotional distress, loss of income, the works.
 
Man, to hell with all this "he poked the hornets nest too much" nonsense. He didn't want to take abuse at the hand at these guys and he stood up to them. He maybe didn't go about it in the best of ways, but at least he didn't take it on the chin.

Best of luck to the guy going forward.
 
Lots of people in here saying Planetside 2 failed. Didn't it make a profit?

For what it's worth, Planetside 2 is the most ambitious FPS game in the past 5 years. Have to give Smed some credit for that.

I think it started turning a profit early this year or late last.

And there still are no games that even tries to do what planetside does, which is a shame because it has been one of my absolute favorite games the past few years. Unfortunately it has also been evident for 2 of those years that player numbers weren't really going to increase. They've been too slow to fix technical and game breaking bugs, and too slow to roll out promised features. The game has been slowly improving the whole time, but probably too slow to make an impact.

Edit: Also, fuck the lizard idiots. People like that are the worst scum on the net, and it infuriates me that someone is more or less shit out of luck if they become a target of that kind of harassment.
 

Fathom

Banned
Planetside 2 is incredibly boring and nearly unplayable if you're not in a big group of friends. Even with that though it's always felt so follow to me, like if I want to shoot people and use vehicles I'd rather be playing BF4. If there was some kind of player based command structure to PS2 with one guy ordering every person in the faction around and groups forming, that would be cool.
 

espher

Member
If there was some kind of player based command structure to PS2 with one guy ordering every person in the faction around and groups forming, that would be cool.

So... if all servers were full of team players? That doesn't happen in Battlefield, nevermind a game of PS2's scale.

ServerSmash et al is as close as you'll get (and those are really fun).
 

Mozendo

Member
What worries me about PS2 while I enjoy playing it a lot these days, is that I get the impression it's not going to be improve much in the future.

Yeah I agree with you.
I do enjoy the game but it still feels like it's in a beta state because it seems like the game is supposed to have more content, not only that they still need to fix some kinks like the C4's detonation time being way too long.
 
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.

I played planetside 2 on PC for like 8 months, spent way too much on the game and got a handful of gaffers to play but idk, its just one of those games where you have to play with a dedicated group or else the game isn't amazing. Some of my favorite online shooter experiences were in Planetside 2 but the amount of coordination and planning required to get a good 1-2 platoons (48-96) players group to play is tough. I quit a few months before the hossin expansion because I needed a break and wanted to play something else (ps2 was taking too much of my gaming time lol) and by the time i came back, alot of the ppl I played with (including gaffers) had moved on
 

Jarnet87

Member
Has there even been a peep about EQ Next since Daybreak was acquired/name changed? I was under the impression that people had sort of accepted that it wasn't going to survive...

not that I know of. They cancelled SoE Live which is their big event in August. If we don't get an update by August of 2016 then it is dead.

I think that big ambitious project that they wanted for EQ Next is dead and they will just put out some sad mixture of a guild wars/wow clone and slap the Everquest name on it.
 

mnannola

Member
You are a sociopath.

Excuse me? Something has been holding up EQ Next, as it was pitched two years ago with almost no news since. Shouldn't Smedley take the blame for this?

I think Smedley is a good guy, but they need someone that will get things moving.
 

Etnos

Banned
You guys are thinking of Brad McQuaid, different person. There is an article about the huge failure of Vanguard which lead SoE taking it over.

Naa, I'm aware who is who. Actually Smedley gave money to McQuaid, imagine that..

Smedley-SOE were financing Vanguard, when they realise Vanguard was a train wreck of epic proportions, Smedley bought Sigil, smart move?

Not really
 

Jumplion

Member
The talk about Planetside 2's failures, how Daybreak Games is starting to flounder, how Smedly ruined SWG whatever;

That's all irrelevant.

What needs to be focused on is the reason for his leaving, which was essentially due to harassment and terrorism including, but not limited to;
  • DDoS attacks on the games
  • Ruining his credit score by making false claims in in his name.
  • SWAT teams sent to his house multiple times
  • A flight grounded by a bomb threat
    (source)
Put aside your disappointment and focus on the shittiness that was allowed to continue from assholes who were probably just as disapointed as you were with the games, only this time they decided to take it a step further and be supreme assholes (to put it lightly).
 

Carcetti

Member
Everyone in the thread probably agrees that the lizard squad people should be shot into the sun with a giant cannon so there's just not so much to discuss there.
 

Etnos

Banned
The talk about Planetside 2's failures, how Daybreak Games is starting to flounder, how Smedly ruined SWG whatever;

That's all irrelevant.

Not really, we are discussing his handy work as a video game executive in a video game forum, sounds very relevant to me.

  • DDoS attacks on the games
  • Ruining his credit score by making false claims in in his name.
  • SWAT teams sent to his house multiple times
  • A flight grounded by a bomb threat
    (source)

That shit is disgraceful, no one is justifying that in here anyway.

Put aside your disappointment and focus on the shittiness that was allowed to continue from assholes who were probably just as disapointed as you were with the games, only this time they decided to take it a step further and be supreme assholes (to put it lightly).

Noup, I have my disappointment right were it should be after spending a decent amount of $ over the years on Smedley SOE promises.

lernt my lesson to late.
 
Hahaha. You guys think just Planetside 2 and SWG suffered? No no, DC Universe Online has suffered greatly as well and joined the battered brothers of online games club. And it was by SoE's own admission that it was the company's #1 profiting game. The poor game.
 

Shanlei91

Sonic handles my blue balls
Hahaha. You guys think just Planetside 2 and SWG suffered? No no, DC Universe Online has suffered greatly as well and joined the battered brothers of online games club. And it was by SoE's own admission that it was the company's #1 profiting game. The poor game.

What happened with that game?
 

ViciousDS

Banned
Things are looking NOT good for EverQuest Next.

And that is an absolutely terrible shame.

However, I wish Smedley the best and hope this does help Daybreak Games catch a break.

meh, no holy trinity, skills and everything made me believe it was guild wars 2 2.0


no thanks.....as soon as I saw that reveal of no holy trin and levels.....I said nope, GW2 was utterly lame compared to the first one, not falling for that shit again.
 

FranXico

Member
The harassment this guy was subjected to was just too much.

Sorry to hear that he had to leave. He put up with a lot as it is.
 

Somnia

Member
Naa, I'm aware who is who. Actually Smedley gave money to McQuaid, imagine that..

Smedley-SOE were financing Vanguard, when they realise Vanguard was a train wreck of epic proportions, Smedley bought Sigil, smart move?

Not really

Incorrect, when MS dropped Vanguard is when SOE swooped in and got it for extremely cheap. SOE actually profited on Vanguard from what people said due to how little they paid for it.

The code and engine were so horrible for that game it was beyond fixing though. SOE gave it a shot though.
 
What happened with that game?


Where to start...

Well let's start with the basics. See, Daybreak and painted this picture that hey, we can let you get nicer helpings of DLC content for smaller prices. For example, instead of buying the 10 dollar DLC pack, they broke it down down further. So hey you just want maybe that power and one mission, you instead pay 3.50 each.

That's fine and dandy.. until you note they pretty much removed purchasing episodes, and now to buy all that content individually, it'll cost 45-ish bucks for some DLC packs. Now with the new 'episodic content' you have to buy 2 missions a month, instead of getting a full pack of things to do. It's increasingly more expensive if you're a premium player to the point you might as well just quit unless you're going to sub.


But of course that's not all. They recently just reworked the mission structure and content that stops rewarding you altogether for doing lower level content. Along with making it MUCH slower to progress without spending replay badges. (Hint hint, one of their better incoming items.) Basically you only get two tiers of relevant content to get rewards for instead of the entire end-game system. Which wouldn't be a problem if this game had say.. WoW levels of content, but all this game has is sitting around in hubs, and maybe four brief dailies per small open world area.

Now tie it in with the gear price changes and they want you to pay on average much higher then you did before with their new 'mark system', no more bonus monthly marks, and the fact the game still uses cooldowns on instances for weekly plus stuff so have fun spamming those same few instances over and over again. Then the recent change to the best gear being drop only now, vs the game's been since launch about vendor stuff. With the obvious guess that the drop rates are indeed awful..

They still have a habit of overbuffing powers when they're 'reviewed' then on schedule a month later after people respec to it they nerf it back to normal rates, and legends have been getting more and more overpowered to get more sales out of them. Shazaam and Black Adam for instance are on a whole other level compared to some who can't get any love like Superman who's one of the worst legends.


...And this is just the start. Me? I'm not even bothered by half these things. I'm a lifetimer, so I get all the content whatever, and I get replay badges that I've never spent and with how slow they release content stuff my Stipend lets me get whatever legend I want or whatever goofy marketplace thing they want. It's just these are some awful changes.
 
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