Real Time Worlds in Trouble?

[Wools]

All unconfirmed at the moment but it's looking likely something is wrong with the developer.

http://www.vg247.com/2010/08/13/rumour-realtime-worlds-warns-of-drastic-apb-cuts-lays-off-entire-myworld-team/

[merf]

not a surprise I have to say, they spent a fortune developing APB and it seems to have sunk without trace (at least judging by various forum threads). Can't see them getting funding for another extended development experimental game type people can't quite get their heads round.

shame really, they should have just done Crackdown 2.

[Flabio]

They did seem to have spent an *awful* lot developing APB, they weren't ever shy about that in interviews.

[vanpeebles]

MMO's are usually bobbins and it's a tough market. They went off in the completely wrong direction.

[MikeRox]

Aye too much ambition too. APB had so much promise, but doesn't seem like they had the resources to finish it despite blowing a load on it.

[scottishgod]

The original Crackdown ie the Projet: My World team paid the price for a bunch of talentless lazy C*$%s squandering ?100 million on APB

[Decider-VT]

Funny that APB was the result when you consider that RTW was moaning about potential employees in the UK not being up to scratch when they were hawking for dev talent in Canada. Keeping a skeleton staff to maintain APB is just silly.

Edit: Just realised that the above sounded a bit snide. Obviously a lot of the RTW team were talented but blowing $100 million on APB just seems like a really poor decision for a developer of that size.

[EvilBoris]

It's is a shame it's going this way, I think there are some really creative minds there, Crackdown was fantastic and created a new genre and APB was a really nice take on a really stale genre and I admire them for that.

[scottishgod]

Funny that APB was the result when you consider that RTW was moaning about potential employees in the UK not being up to scratch when they were hawking for dev talent in Canada. Keeping a skeleton staff to maintain APB is just silly.

Edit: Just realised that the above sounded a bit snide. Obviously a lot of the RTW team were talented but blowing $100 million on APB just seems like a really poor decision for a developer of that size.

Yeh its a bit snide but people that I know lost their jobs. Unless you're releasing a GTA or Modern Warefare no game should really cost anywhere near that much.

[GluedOnBeard]

It's is a shame it's going this way, I think there are some really creative minds there, Crackdown was fantastic and created a new genre and APB was a really nice take on a really stale genre and I admire them for that.

Most of the minds behind Crackdown started Ruffian Games non?

[Decider-VT]

Yeh its a bit snide but people that I know lost their jobs. Unless you're releasing a GTA or Modern Warefare no game should really cost anywhere near that much.

Ah, sorry. It wasn't intended to be a jab at anybody other than the people responsible for the studio stretching itself to breaking point over the cost of APB. It's never good to see a UK dev on the brink of going under or people losing their jobs.

[dataDave]

I knew it'd be a bad idea trying to make an MMO. Not only would it be crap, but it'd be a suicidal waste of money.

[scottishgod]

Most of the minds behind Crackdown started Ruffian Games non?

What i'm told from now ex employees was that there were only a few folk that left to start Ruffian. A lot of the original folk who went all the way back to DMA Design. They finished Crackdown and went onto My World not having anything to do with APB. Dave Jones is getting rid of people who worked with him right back to the Amiga and Snes etc yet keeping a lot of inexperienced Juniors and Testers. It makes no real sense. Not a single person has been cut from APB even though its now a dead horse. I'm led to believe they managed to spend 18 million on servers alone.

[Sixty]

It seems to depend on who you ask. Realtime Worlds say most of the Crackdown team is still with them. Ruffian says most of them jumped ship.

This is such a shame, though. Realtime Worlds were ones to watch after Crackdown but all that potential didn't seem to amount to much. They should've stuck with kick ass action-style games rather than experimental weird stuff that looked unlikely to succeed from the start. You've gotta give them credit for taking risks when so many publishers are risk-averse these days, but it's pointless trying something like that if it's going to lead to the death of your studio.

I hope they can pull through somehow, but if not, those at RTW responsible for Crackdown should merge with Ruffian, Microsoft should give them loads of time and a huge budget and then they can make a completely amazing Crackdown 3. Not likely, I know, but it'd be nice.

[JP]

It seems to be over...

Realtime Worlds, developer of ABP, has gone into administration ? the first word coming earlier this afternoon from an employee via Twitter.

The news comes after 60 staff were made redundant at the troubled studio last week.

Speaking to Eurogamer this afternoon under condition of anonymity, a source close to the developer revealed that RTW CEO ? and former Take 2 boss ? Gary Dale flew into Scotland earlier today to break the bad news to staff.

The source added that the APB team has been "given until Friday to clear their desks" ? mirroring the situation of those working on MyWorld last week. The US office in Boulder, Colorado is also believed to have been "stripped down of staff".

Senior management ? including some already axed from the company last week ? are understood to have been made aware of the move, and Dale's visit, via email yesterday.

Further employee chatter on Twitter this afternoon suggests moves are currently being touted to retain a core team of staff to support online game APB.

Eurogamer attempted to contact the studio for clarification, but was told initially by a representative: "All management are in a meeting ? there's no-one you can speak to". We've just been called back and told to direct all enquiries to the administrator, Begbies Traynor Group - we'll update with more information when we have it.

Realtime Worlds was understood to be close to completing social networking project MyWorld, in addition to the recently launched online game APB. Both games will likely be sold on as part of the administration process.