Buying PoxNora...The (NOT SO) Final Post->Read!

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Bondman007, Jul 22, 2018.

  1. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    You are refering to "they" as DOG or the founders of DOG or peuple like yourself who worked for DOG? You mean space war and pox etc was made mainly for someone else just under the DOG name?

    About investors I was refering to Angel investor firm who listed DOG as one of 47 projects.they have invested in. Usually they just put money for equity and give some advice. I hardly think they DOG were developing games for those passive angel investors.
     
  2. Sokolov

    Sokolov The One True Cactuar Octopi

    I am referring to the company, DOG, as an entity.

    One of the ways game studios (particularly indies) generate revenue is by acquiring work from other entities who want software/games made. For example, Huntsman: Winter's Curse was made by DOG for this reason. Universal Studios wanted a video game to come out alongside the movie. So DOG got paid to make that game.


    Space Wars, yes. Pox is DOG's.

    Space Wars was made for a client, who paid DOG for services rendered.

    And yes, angel investors of this type don't typically pick what the company actually does - so while they have a vested interest in the company doing well, they wouldn't normally be involved in picking which projects to do or clients to take on. They just want the company to do well - and one of the ways the company keeps going if by continuing to get clients and generate revenue.

    (This is different than, say, an angel investor in something like a tech startup which would have a very specific goal, say Twitter.)

    ~

    Anyway, point is, money wasn't "borrowed" from Pox development to work on other stuff.
     
    Last edited: Nov 12, 2018
  3. Gprotein

    Gprotein The King of Potatoes

    Wow these posts take me back. Trolls have always received way to much attention on these forums. This in turn drives away seriously interested individuals. Polltroy admitted he didnt read previous posts. He just started posting....a lot. This gives him the attention he desires while giving anyone else at least three pages of worthless yammering in a post that has great information. I would love to see pox 2.0 but i do not miss the feeding of the trolls.
     
    Bondman007 likes this.
  4. Sokolov

    Sokolov The One True Cactuar Octopi

    I can understand why you feel this way. For me, my goal of replying is that:
    1. It takes a lot for me to assume someone is a troll, and I do ignore a few select people on these forums. Maybe that's naive, but I like giving people the benefit of the doubt until they prove me wrong.
    2. I like to correct incorrect information. So in my replies, I strive to provide accurate information, and hopefully that is of interest to others.
     
  5. Anotherblackman

    Anotherblackman I need me some PIE!

    you just messed up by thinking everything I ever said was trolling cuz I wasn't popular.

    I had a elegant vision for this game under your company but it was all torched in hopes of some watered down, bland kool-aid.
    I was going to throw a lemon, with some cherries along with hella sugar in the red kool-aid, but you just added kool-aid and water and called it a day then mass released this in capri-sun patches.

    the people that loved this game wanted the best for it and you just cater to people who never play it or had a desire to play at the level that I used to play (which was consistent top 100)
     
  6. Sokolov

    Sokolov The One True Cactuar Octopi

    For the record, I never thought you were a troll.

    Once I think someone is a troll or deliberately not participating in good faith, I stop replying to them and put them on ignore. I never did that with you.
     
    Last edited: Nov 12, 2018
  7. Sokolov

    Sokolov The One True Cactuar Octopi

    I agree, which is why I took the time to respond to most people who were putting in some effort to discuss something - even if I disagreed with them, I still wanted to better understand where they were coming from.

    It's also why the game has had a player council for many years (which I was a part of before becoming a dev); in order to gather feedback directly from the community.

    It's unfortunate that you feel that engaging with your concerns meant I thought you were a troll. I am sorry your felt that way.
     
  8. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    So what you are saying is DOG kind of supported Pox with money from other projects? But if this is true it means DOG is in some kind of troubles not because of Pox failing but some other reasons? Obviously they fired alot of staff (all?), but if they are not in money problems, it definately would have made sense to spend a little more time on thwir favourite project - Pox, to put it in pause in a stable working state. Even if they could not fix lags, they could have made another update fixing maybe chat and aome bugs. And they could have communicated this pause to community. Like "Sorry guys you will be on your own for some time. We dont abandon game we just cant work on it at present it soea.not bring enough money."

    Total silence tells me it must be money problems. And money problems must be because of failed launches, regardless if they did them for themselves or for others.
     
  9. JaceDragon

    JaceDragon I need me some PIE!

    So it was polltroy, i have him in my ignore list and though you all went crazy respond thing i don't see. That was funny
     
    Bondman007 likes this.
  10. Cinder405

    Cinder405 I need me some PIE!

    Look man point is ....Poxnora is going down regardless. Bondsman did all he could. And even if they were to reply the amount of money needed to purchase assests is pretty darn high. So on to the next similar game man.
     
  11. RedCourage

    RedCourage The King of Potatoes


    Lies.
     
  12. Anotherblackman

    Anotherblackman I need me some PIE!

    What im saying is you had a chance to create some real solid game play, but you took a lot of other bullshit opinions from the nerdiest people on the planet that were the first to jump ship once they cards were obliterated by the same Bane Shift they were whining about.

    I don't know where "consolidation" came from but the fact that you came from the oldest age of poxnora (the 200 exp and tokens meant something days) and passed up a chance to make one of the most epic games ever, even more epic(which from my point of view was extremely do-able after you guys got the game from whom-ever).


    An entire revamp wad debatable from me unless you all needed to switch the coding. The most that needed to be done was some bugfixes (burn in hell KF and your metamorph abusing basterds vs impenetrable as an "upgrade") a few abilities removed, adjusted, or some nora cost adjusted, and bwham poxnora.
    If you had brought back the customization of the old days and combined it with the power and creative ingenuity and flavor of factions and their designs, then this game would be one good mislead web comic from the millions of downloads arena.

    I was one of the few people who tried to tell the entire game to head this direction instead of the way, but it was just nerfed to many levels of unplayability, commons were better than shoeboxed legends and limiteds, Nora cost were made at random apparently, any and all money spent of the game was a middle finger to sit on after these patches, and worst of all the designers didn't play so they had 0 clues on whats actually fun.

    I played poxnora because it was the most constant mix of tactical preparedness, strategic unpredictability, and catastrophic chaotic victory or loss, very often than most leaving a lesson in victory but mostly in defeat.

    then it became about whatever yall made it into and me, and a majority of people who were me audience wise, bounced like one piece gear 4. While im glad to hear you never ignored me, I never saw anything done from my point of view to improve the game for people like me, and the proof is in the pudding.

    I still tried to play but its all just so "meh" now i feel like this game was permanently crippled under whoever past 3 years of leadership.
     
  13. Sokolov

    Sokolov The One True Cactuar Octopi

    Everyone always thinks their ideas are the best ideas - but the truth is we tend to overestimate the value of our own ideas, myself/designers included. Doesn't mean you are wrong, of course, but it's easy to say "Just do what I say and everything will be awesome" but much harder to actually pull it off.

    It's true that the original revamp that removed the stat customization of units changed the nature of the game, but Pox also had its best years after that revamp, so "proof is in the pudding" in that case as you say. That said, I am sure there's a market for that approach as well, but the game would have to have a different business model most likely for that to be effective long-term.

    ~

    The truth is when I came back a couple of years ago, SOE/Daybreak was ready to just shut the door on the game. Your thinking that it was "extremely do-able" to make the game succeed again is extremely optimistic. The fact is Pox had significantly declined at that point in many ways and would have required significant investment to make any major impacts. Also, the reality is that it's almost impossible to change the trajectory of a game even in the early days once that trajectory is established - even big studios with massive budgets often can't save a game with a bad launch - and it's even harder when a game is at the end of its life cycle. I will have more about all of this when I finish writing up my history of PoxNora for everyone to read.

    In any case, DOG re-acquired it and Gedden did a "revamp" that, IMO, was too heavy handed in the way it removed a lot of abilities (particularly unique ones) and made many units almost the same on the basis of race or class.

    I came back shortly after that revamp and since I came back and took over "lead design," I have done 3 things primarily:
    • reintroduce uniqueness to units and themes
      • a large part of this was reversing/modifying the ability customization which the Gedden revamp used a "bucket" system that, for example, made all vampires have the same upgrade set... this was a good idea in theory, but in practice it basically made all vampires very similar to one another in terms of functionality
    • fix bugs
      • I was hoping that when we reached the end of life that I could at least leave everyone with a less buggy game, but this was basically a black hole of endless bugs
    • consolidate or diversify existing abilities that were largely the same as one another to reduce needless complexity and push real differences rather than just different in abilities names only
    Unfortunately, more major changes/fixes were sort of off the table - while I had free reign over content, there was very little coding time available for more major adjustments. So, for example, even if I had wanted to bring back stat customization, that wasn't really an option.

    Still, I tried my best to keep things fresh/interesting with what little resources there was available, and my understanding is that most players who were still playing the game appreciated my efforts.

    To be honest, I don't remember seeing you much the last couple of years since I came back.

    Honestly, I think it's more likely just that you have played out the game. Nothing stays novel forever without major changes (which in reality Pox largely avoided outside of the removal of stat customization). In reality, games lasting as long as Pox did is rare.

    Even MtG has basically reinvented itself multiple times whether it was core rule changes or core design philosophy and basically all of my friends who grew up playing the game 20 years ago largely only play Draft and EDH/Commander now.
     
    Last edited: Nov 18, 2018
    yuore and Bondman007 like this.
  14. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    What about some of us go together and collect some money to pay for one last update and for say 5 years server/webhosting? It seems DOG is not gone, just they dont care to put money into this.

    I think for little money/effort, make a small update, fix chat maybe some other stuff that was already done but not uploaded, and make some announcement to players by email that there was an update, maybe game will be alive a bit again.

    What you guys think? SOK, could this be possible? Obviously they dont want to sell it nor spend more time/money on the game, but it also must be good for them to avoid some badwill by helping what is left of the pox community.
     
  15. Bondman007

    Bondman007 I need me some PIE!

    LOL, nope...
     
  16. Bondman007

    Bondman007 I need me some PIE!

    Ok man, so I have just one question that I am going to ask...

    What insider info do you have that supports your statement that "DOG is not gone..."? That is completely contrary to all of our findings...
    DOG office numbers are disconnected...DOG e-mail goes mainly unchecked...DOG employees/founders are working for other companies...Where are you getting this info?
     
  17. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    I think it was SOK who said its not gone? That they just lost interest in putting more money/time into Pox black hole. He explained they work like studio on other projects. Also it seems the owners/founders of DOG are not (yet) associated with new projects?

    If DOG is really gone and beyond saving, they for sure could talk to us somehow?
     
  18. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    We can rule that out as they replied at first. If it was due to a super strong NDA they could not reply at all. If it was due to some weak NDA they could still reply back they are not interested or some very high price etc.

    But they keep silent. Which gives me conclusion its due on of these:

    1. total uninterest by owners of pox
    2. dont take inquire serious at all
    3. dont want to talk with community on forums
    4. they have money problems and feel too bad/stressed to even think about pox

    If either of 1-4, they could atill want to help out to make.one last update and pay for servers if we manage to show them some cash for that. Its always good to avoid badwill regardless if just for the owners as individuals or as a company if it has some kind of future.

    But if

    5. reason is NDA because they already work on some other big deal to save Pox or rights to it or sell DOG

    then of course this is a no-go for one last update even if we collect the money.
     
  19. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    If numbers are disconnected it all points towards money problems. Id say they dont reply out of stress and lack of time/interest, no other reason. Sad situation.
     
  20. b33rdragon

    b33rdragon The King of Potatoes

    After being a very active member of Pox since the early days, I have to say it is nice to see the fan base is still some what interested in the mythical idea of a player lead buy out. I wish it was years ago and this idea was brought up before Dan sold the first time to Sony. That was a tragic day.
     
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