Sad Day at LucasArts
Just came across this news now:
LucasArts President, Executives Out As Publisher Shakes Up Top Brass
Today is indeed a sad day at LucasArts. I admired Darrell Rodriguez for his commitment to old-school adventure games and his general interest in taking risks (ala Lucidity), in expanding and revisiting old properties (ala SoMI:SE and SoMI2:LESE) as well as an interest in trying to create new properties outside of Star Wars (Fracture comes to mind).
What exactly does this say about the future of LucasArts? I have no idea but if we don't get someone else with a mentality like that of Rodriguez's, we may very well be seeing a return to the Jim Ward era LucasArts.
LucasArts President, Executives Out As Publisher Shakes Up Top Brass
Today is indeed a sad day at LucasArts. I admired Darrell Rodriguez for his commitment to old-school adventure games and his general interest in taking risks (ala Lucidity), in expanding and revisiting old properties (ala SoMI:SE and SoMI2:LESE) as well as an interest in trying to create new properties outside of Star Wars (Fracture comes to mind).
What exactly does this say about the future of LucasArts? I have no idea but if we don't get someone else with a mentality like that of Rodriguez's, we may very well be seeing a return to the Jim Ward era LucasArts.
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But yes, I am really bummed out by this news, he was doing great things at LucasArts. I only hope his successor continues with the program.
Lucas Arts its the most unstable company i've ever seen! The way they treat their franchises it's horrible. Lego's, Monkey Island, their lack of releasing their own IP. I will say this TTG rescued Sam and Max and i hope they rescue and take out of their hands Monkey Island!
So many people wanted to play their old games, and they've been reluctant to release them to sale. That is until Darryl Rodriguez came along and released the sale of old adventure games to Steam and thus was born TOMI too.
My question is Will there continue to be new releases of adventure games?
Sounds like MI2:SE will be one of the last releases of adventure games, in quite a while!
And it's not the end of the world. We don't even know who the new guy's gonna be.
I think Im going to cry!
If this happens you can be asured that adventures as well as new IP and more experimental projects will be on top of my priority list again.
But how did TTG negotiated the Monkey Island franchise?
I also got another question maybe to one of TTG staffers: Does remaining an open forum for TOMI means theres more Monkey Island to come or not?
Is the change of president influence and affect other upcoming TTG projects or not? What does the resignation of the LA president mean to TTG?
No. They still have a forum open for Bone and Telltale Texas Hold 'Em, and those are probably not going too far. Bone has been half-complete for years, and Telltale doesn't have the rights to make a game anymore.
It means the big business guys over at LucasArts are changing, including the executive staff that signed off on the Tales licensing. Depending on the viewpoints of the new executives in regards to LucasArts' adventure game holdings, Telltale could be denied the ability to make any more games based on LucasArts-owned worlds.
It was a licensing agreement. LucasArts issued Telltale a license to create Tales of Monkey Island, which would've been a legal agreement including many factors such as how much control LucasArts has over the development of the game and related products, what (if any) Monkey Island merchandise Telltale was allowed to produce, what amount of the profits LucasArts receives, and other things like that. LucasArts retained the rights to Monkey Island, they just allowed Telltale to add one game to the franchise.
The forums for all of Telltale's games are still open. The Bone forum is still open, and there's absolutely no indication of that series picking back up anytime soon. There's potential for discussion about these games no matter how much time has passed since their release. So no, the open Tales of Monkey Island forum doesn't indicate anything whatsoever.
The only way this would possibly affect upcoming Telltale projects is if they were looking to license anything else from LucasArts. Telltale is independent from LucasArts, so the change in management only affects them in terms of how LucasArts might be willing to cooperate with them. So unless they're looking to make new games based on Monkey Island, Grim Fandango, Loom, Maniac Mansion, or any of the other LucasArts properties, this really shouldn't affect them at all.
Edit: Damn, ninja'd.
Lucas Arts is well known to cancel games over 90% done, I really hope they dont do that to Monkey Island 2 Special edition but its on shaky grounds, it woudnt be a surprise if it gets canceled now.
EDIT: OH!! and let the new era of even more starwars games begin.
Don't even think such a thing.
That is what I worry about too...... I am so afraid that they will go right back to sitting on this stuff in favor of making another version of whatever other game is popular only with star wars.
Rodriguez will be missed.
Now hopefully everyone will understand why some of us were a bit annoyed with TOMI finale...
Damn. :mad:
I swear if MI2: SE gets canceled I'm going to yell until my voice gives out. This can really go either way and I am not excited at all.
That thought crossed my mind somewhere.
It's also telling that it's not been that long since Jim Ward left... so I reckon it's a bit of both.
If that does happen, then each of us must bombard Lucasarts with dozens of e-mails (each) voicing our disgust in the company.
E-Mails?! Heck... If it's cancelled we should all arrange a live-protest with signs and protest-chants in front of the LucasArts building...
What about pitchforks and flaming torches?
That almost sounds like a circus.
Maybe the brass at LA will finally realize that dormant IPs can be licensed out AND get money out of it instead of just letting them rot into oblivion, and command the new guy to continue licensing stuff besides doing the usual Star Wars games that the folks at LucasArt love to churn out.
Let's stay possitive...
90's: MI1 and MI2
00's: Curse (1999) and EFMI
10: TOMI, ??? The remakes dont count as new games, for me!
I love tower defense games.
So, er, how do you count your decades? They start on X9 or something?
Because I'm pretty sure decades are supposed to start on a X1 year if you're being technical (since there was no year 00), and on a X0 year if you're being more "logical" (since it feels weird that 2000 would be part of the 90s or 2010 part of the 00s).