My speculation is no better than most everyone else's Vik. I think Valkyrie is a bit of a gamble; it'll either be a huge, runaway success (like DUST 514 was supposed to be) or a bit of a fizzler. I think the Facebook acquisition of Oculus can certainly help, though, since one challenge was increasing adoption of the hardware (and FB will presumably lower the barrier to entry by helping provide cheaper Rift units and "mainstreaming" the idea of VR culturally). I think ruling it out now (i.e. prematurely) as a likely failure doesn't give CCP its due credit, despite past history with DUST 514. If CCP can end up as a studio behind one of the Rift's successful launch titles, then I think it eases the pressure elsewhere considerably. It's a pretty savvy move, even if it's a gamble. They'll have more resources to sink back into EVE development if it succeeds, and at the same time vindicate their model of "moon shots" somewhat (which I don't think is inherently flawed, despite past failures).
I have zero place commenting on the future of Legion or EVE since I haven't followed either very closely. From what little I've gathered it sounds like they're wisely focusing on doing some genuine iteration on EVE and taking a more measured approach to Legion, but I really have no idea there.
Company culture is my biggest concern and question mark. This "War on the Impossible" stuff isn't sustainable. It's okay to be ambitious and take on projects like Valkyrie et al, but there has to be a more humble, level-headed approach when taking on such massive challenges. DUST 514 was supposed to be a hugely successful AAA FPS on a Console. AAA = 1, Console = 2, FPS = 3...that's three things CCP had never tried before, and their approach didn't give due reverence to the enormousness of taking on three wildly new challenges all in one, and most importantly, at the same time predicting and projecting huge success. A more humble approach would have been to make something smaller, build experience, and then expand outwards from that - or to leave ample room for the project to be a fizzler and a learning process (which their projections didn't). Aiming for all three things and projecting success was, put together, too much. This sort of thing is, plainly, hubris, and is a very real and recurring cultural issue from my experience. It greatly hinders critical self-reflection (both internally and taking in external feedback, like you mention) and divorces people in the decision-making process from their failures - at which point they aren't really learning from them. It's not failure that aggravates me when I think about this stuff, it's the inability to learn from it, and consequently repeat it (with hard working people's livelihoods being the price paid).
As far as "Ooh shiny!" goes, I think CCP is pretty well aware of this tendency internally and there is a lot of resistance to "Jesus Features" as they're called. Hell, "Say no to Jesus Features" was one of the company's yearly mottos as far back as 2004/5! Point being: they know it's an internal cultural problem and have taken steps to avoid it. I suspect that particular issue is at least mostly under control, but probably still rears its head as an emergency release valve during the hectic moments (certainly true during the Incarna debacle, when some absolutely extraordinary features were being proposed as a way to indicate a "return to a focus on EVE"). There is always going to be a conflict between iteration on core gameplay and providing brand new features. The former is seen as less marketable than the latter. Past successes like Apocrypha lend credence to the idea that big new shiny stuff drives subscriber numbers, but the metrics are quite a bit more nuanced and suggest that both models work. Another point is that Apocrypha was a Jesus Feature ("Shiny") done really well, due in no small part to the fact that almost the entirety of the WoD staff was re-purposed to support its development (aside: the half-truth of the argument that funding WoD never impacted EVE is no more evident than here, where you can see how a united focus on just the one title created something pretty amazing).
I think they'll survive these latest layoffs, as troubling as they are. CCP is a tremendously resilient and adaptable company still to this day filled with some incredibly talented people. I'm an eternal optimist, so I think there will be change, too, in terms of the culture of hubris. It's hard to imagine that at this point, CCP's upper management is still oblivious to the consequences of taking on huge challenges and expecting unequaled success. At some point even the most insulated of executive decision makers will take notice. If they somehow weren't already, then this latest round of layoffs should hammer the message home.
Back to lost talent: It seems that much if not all of the ATL GM crew have also been let go (they are in the "Publishing" division, so CCP's press release is technically correct, if utterly disingenuous). You guys will never know what you lost there, but there were guys I worked with whose knowledge of and passion for the storyline was truly awe-inspiring. One guy in particular who was let go was an absolute beast when it came to EVE lore, and his departure is really sad in those terms. He was ten times the writer and storyline nerd that I was, and it hurts to see that he never got the ridiculously awesome opportunities to contribute to it that I did. That said, you still have heavyweights like Delegate Zero and others contributing their impressive brainpower as time and resources permit, so I don't think its curtains for storyline in EVE (or EVE in general). Not by a long shot.
Author
Topic: Black Thursday: Layoffs hit CCP, WoD cancellation inside story leaks (Read 4470 times)