With so little context except your hyperlinks, I was forced to dig through those forum links and didn't come to the real meat of the issue until page 3. You could have just linked to page 3... there wasn't much worthwhile for discussion in the preceding pages.
My bad, guys. In my defence, it was like 2 am and I was seriously distressed by reading this stuff.
As a project manager, I'd say that "Cesar drove his agenda without considering the knowledgeable opinions of available domain experts." He must be grooming himself to be a future CEO.
*I* would say Cesar intentionally worked things out so that Vivendi would shut them down, the outrage would stir a big commotion up and bring all fans out of the woodwork, and then magically "the fans would save the project" (aka Vivendi grants Cesar the license they'd previously arranged, on his birthday) at which all heck would break loose for the project's popularity. Which it has.
I personally can't bear reading 'Vivendi was on my banned list but now I am sending them a thankyou letter! OMG I'm so happy' etc. I think it's just sad to see the Sierra community like this.
"Say", their PR director, also doesn't seem to be very good at his job. He fell just short of personally attacking Josh on the forums, and then had the gall to tell everyone that they shouldn't be discussing the matter on the forums.
"Say" is actually a she. And a real bi.., uh, hard person to work/deal with.
I also thought her grasp of English left a lot to be desired, but yes, her attitude was pretty unbelievable. Basically attacking Josh for voicing concerns. The culture of the fangame and their community appears to be "Hey, let's just look at the fluffy stuff. We're not interested in much else." Which is fine, it's a game after all, but this is a serious matter. For a supposed PR rep she didn't appear to handle the situation well at all.
Basically she's a glamour pony who's in love with herself. Which is fine day-to-day, but she brings that personality to KQ9's forums and her PR role in the project. I recall being abused by her in one of the save KQ9 threads because I questioned why they were going to be comprehensively shutdown and not try other avenues. (Though i guess if it was planned, maybe this explains why KQIX was so happy to do no tmuch..)
I still hope that TSL is a good game. I recognize that Cesar and Say are not the only project participants and that there are a number of other involved parties who are working on it, and as I haven't seen their comments on this issue, I have to maintain a neutral opinion of them. We do not know if they approve or disapprove of the hell that Cesar put them through. The strongest thing I can say is that I hope to never work at a company with either Cesar or Say, because they have an attitude of "I know best" which appears to be unsupported by any evidence of real experience. I am concerned that their "win" in this situation may serve to further inflate their apparently overvalued opinions of themselves.
Yes, so do I. I have doubts about its' quality (eg Akril, the other person who once worked on another KQ9, saying "this apple seems to be falling far from the KQ tree".), but it's good for the community and I support it.
I'm pretty sure the majority of people are faultless and also have no idea of what happened. Bet they'd be interested though
I think the 'I know best' attitude more accurately translates into 'If this decision pays off, I will look best'. And it made it onto MTV, so..
My main dislike of the KQ9 culture (note: not the fangame itself, howver) stems from the fact that as you mention, Marten, many (and this goes beyond Cesar) of the people involved have very high opinions of themselves and have a tendency to talk down to people. I mean, if you're talking about programming and I know squat, that's fine, but just general discussion.. I have noticed that AGDI's members (eg Tom) do not engage in such egotistical one-upmanship.
I hold the same opinion of Cesar. Which is why I'm wary about the changes he's made to the game since Luke Jensen (former KQ9 leader/founder) left the team.
What's he done since Luke left? I'm out of the loop.
Personally, i get worried about anyone who calls their fangame project a "resume builder" because of the publicity the 'save KQIX' farce got (he said that in one of his many glorifying interviews).
- Alistair
