Volition has been shut down.

[Mr. Freeze]

From the company's official LinkedIn:

RIP to the studio behind Descent, Freespace, Red Faction and Saint's Row. Gone but never forgotten. 

[Lila Feuer]

Wonder what this means for those supposed remasters of SR 1 and 2. It's the only good thing that could come out of this ruptured sewer line now.

[gibfrag]

I guess that SR reboot was really that bad. 

[Mr Masker]

The only games I've played by them was Red Faction: Guerilla, but that was a pretty good game. Some of the best destruction physics gameplay I've seen!

 

RIP

[Panzermann11]

Oh, boy. What about the patch for the PC version of Saints Row 2? They promised to finish it ever since Mike "IdolNinja" Watson, the guy who used to be in charge of fixing the game died of cancer.

Edited September 2, 2023 by Panzermann11

[Kinsie]

20 hours ago, gibfrag said:

I guess that SR reboot was really that bad. 

The SR reboot was just the end of a ten-year run of squandered last chances. Agents of Mayhem almost got them before this, but they were able to live on enough borrowed time for one final crack at it. Which, given their history, probably wouldn't have been their final final crack at it if they hadn't somehow spent $100 million on making it, combined with Embracer's much-publicized recent financial problems. So it goes.

 

21 hours ago, Lila Feuer said:

Wonder what this means for those supposed remasters of SR 1 and 2. It's the only good thing that could come out of this ruptured sewer line now.

 

7 hours ago, Panzermann11 said:

Oh, boy. What about the patch for the PC version of Saints Row 2? They promised to finish it ever since Mike "IdolNinja" Watson, the guy who used to be in charge of fixing the game died of cancer.

It was always comparatively a small side-project by 1-2 devs, but Volition had publicly expressed plans to continue developing and finishing the SR2 re-port in honor of their fallen colleague as recently as last week. Who the hell knows what's going to happen with that now.

[TasAcri]

21 hours ago, Mr Masker said:

The only games I've played by them was Red Faction: Guerilla, but that was a pretty good game. Some of the best destruction physics gameplay I've seen!

 

RIP

 

Doubt it was really them though. Same company yes, but 14 years ago i bet most of the developers in that building were different people.

 

There's a lot of bitterness online about the good old games this company is attached with. They go way back to Descent, a game released in 1995. I highly doubt any of these old devs are affected... They are either retired or working somewhere else. So yeah, i'm not going to feel bitter for a bunch of young, headstrong devs who took the reins and antagonized the old fanbase.

Edited September 2, 2023 by TasAcri

[Mr Masker]

8 hours ago, TasAcri said:

 

Doubt it was really them though. Same company yes, but 14 years ago i bet most of the developers in that building were different people.

Yeah, I've noticed that with loads of companies

 

The Obsidian who made Fallout New Vegas aren't the same people who made The Outer Worlds

The Arkane Studios who made Dishonoured aren't the same people who made Redfall (edit: wrong Arkane, oops. Example still kinda works tho)

 

It just sucks when the companies I like change so much that they can't match that same magic they once had, but that's just time I guess.

Edited September 2, 2023 by Mr Masker

[Mr. Freeze]

6 minutes ago, Mr Masker said:

It just sucks when the companies I like change so much that they can't match that same magic they once had, but that's just time I guess.

 

One of the great things about growing up is seeing your childhood favorite studios go down in flames (RIP Westwood.)

. 

[Kinsie]

45 minutes ago, Mr Masker said:

The Arkane Studios who made Dishonoured aren't the same people who made Redfall (what a fall from grace especially)

Well, yeah. Dishonored was made by Arkane Lyon, who went on to do Deathloop. Redfall was made by Arkane Austin, who previously did Prey 2016.

[TasAcri]

I learned to never get too attached with IPs and titles. Because i know they belong to the publishers and not the developers who make them. Sometimes the new people who handle the sequels or remasters know what they are doing and try their best to respect the original games (see Nightdive Studios). But that's often not the case.

 

Then again, you can even have old, veteran devs who made masterpieces and completely fail at later sequels. See Sakamoto and Metroid: Other M. In that case, yeah, it makes sense to be bitter about it.

Edited September 2, 2023 by TasAcri

[Panzermann11]

6 hours ago, Kinsie said:

It was always comparatively a small side-project by 1-2 devs, but Volition had publicly expressed plans to continue developing and finishing the SR2 re-port in honor of their fallen colleague as recently as last week. Who the hell knows what's going to happen with that now.

I hope the patch is still in the works, because the cancellation of the patch is the very last thing me and the restless spirit of Watson want to see or hear about.

Edited September 2, 2023 by Panzermann11

[Mr Masker]

5 hours ago, Kinsie said:

Well, yeah. Dishonored was made by Arkane Lyon, who went on to do Deathloop. Redfall was made by Arkane Austin, who previously did Prey 2016.

My mistake, but even then I found Prey 2016 to be a very good game, so I'd still consider it a nosedive going into Redfall.

 

Guess I could've thought about my examples a bit more though.

[taufan99]

RIP Volition.

10 hours ago, TasAcri said:

Then again, you can even have old, veteran devs who made masterpieces and completely fail at later sequels. See Sakamoto and Metroid: Other M. In that case, yeah, it makes sense to be bitter about it.

As well as Inafune and Mighty No. 9. *clears throat audibly*

[scalliano]

Quote

"It's about connecting with a type of humour that is more suitable for a larger audience. We all know that society's tastes can change over time. Saints Row 1, 2, 3 – they were games of their time, and with our approach here, it was about bringing Saints Row to a bigger audience and the audience of today." - Rob Loftus, Senior Producer, Volition

I am not going to say a goddamn thing.

[Dreemurr Deceevurr]

Before people start celebrating the death of a studio because they made a bad game:

 

 

[Azuris]

On 9/3/2023 at 7:20 AM, Dreemurr Deceevurr said:

Before people start celebrating the death of a studio because they made a bad game:

 

 

 

Well, to many Factors, did they know beforehead about it and were able to plan for themselfs or was it Hire and Fire Mentality from one day to another?

 

It sounds mean against the Ex Employees, but if it was planed to shut it down, why waste another Month of Money because one Day?

And the Rest of the Month is no one working.

 

And why is the Insurance so crappy to fall away with the Job from one Day to another?

 

In the End, you are only a Number for a Company, expect to be nothing Special and plan for the Worst.

 

Thats whats better in Europe, you have Insurance, everyone has, no Matter how crappy a Company's Move is.

 

And it seems it is even cheaper:

 

 

 

[hybridial]

On 9/2/2023 at 8:51 PM, Mr Masker said:

My mistake, but even then I found Prey 2016 to be a very good game, so I'd still consider it a nosedive going into Redfall.

 

What happened there was Bethesda mandated the developer make the game, Bethesda never had any clear vision for the game, the developers hated working on it and had no idea what they were doing, and as a result 3/4s of the staff left. 

 

I do think the people at Volition who made the new Saints Row however didn't seem to understand their audience, which does suggest perhaps most of the people who worked on the series previously weren't there any more. 

[Mr. Freeze]

On 9/2/2023 at 10:20 PM, Dreemurr Deceevurr said:

Before people start celebrating the death of a studio because they made a bad game:

 

 

 

Embracer announced layoffs and studio closures in June, why'd he think he'd get out unscathed? Chip still as smart as he's ever been. 

[Lila Feuer]

16 hours ago, hybridial said:

 

What happened there was Bethesda mandated the developer make the game, Bethesda never had any clear vision for the game, the developers hated working on it and had no idea what they were doing, and as a result 3/4s of the staff left. 

 

I never knew this, is that why the DLC content is so poorly rated?

[hybridial]

6 hours ago, Lila Feuer said:

 

I never knew this, is that why the DLC content is so poorly rated?

 

Most likely, I will correct what I said, Bethesda probably weren't directly involved, it seems more of a Microsoft/Zenimax mandated project. So a different group of people are to blame for the mismanagement but the entire thing was a shitshow. It's not a good idea to hand a multiplayer looter shooter to a dev who specialised in making immersive sims. 

[Lila Feuer]

3 hours ago, hybridial said:

It's not a good idea to hand a multiplayer looter shooter to a dev who specialised in making immersive sims. 

 

My bad I thought this was about Prey, in the case of Redfall yeah no wonder.

[Dark Pulse]

On 9/1/2023 at 11:37 PM, Panzermann11 said:

Oh, boy. What about the patch for the PC version of Saints Row 2? They promised to finish it ever since Mike "IdolNinja" Watson, the guy who used to be in charge of fixing the game died of cancer.

Yeah, that ain't happening anymore. Corporations got other priorities. After all, some suits in Embracer are going "Well he's dead and we aren't going to make any money off this, so fuck him."

 

It'll be fixed when fans fucking reverse-engineer the game.

[OniriA]

Sucks, but from what I've heard the last Saints Row sucked huge ballsacks.

 

Make a financial blunder these days and Capitalism will basically take care of the rest. It's the cold, harsh commercial industry we live in doing its work.

Edited September 6, 2023 by OniriA

[Panzermann11]

3 hours ago, Dark Pulse said:

Yeah, that ain't happening anymore. Corporations got other priorities. After all, some suits in Embracer are going "Well he's dead and we aren't going to make any money off this, so fuck him."

 

It'll be fixed when fans fucking reverse-engineer the game.

I'm just wondering where you got the info that they aren't working on the patch anymore.

Edited September 6, 2023 by Panzermann11

[Master O]

4 hours ago, Dark Pulse said:

Yeah, that ain't happening anymore. Corporations got other priorities. After all, some suits in Embracer are going "Well he's dead and we aren't going to make any money off this, so fuck him."

 

It'll be fixed when fans fucking reverse-engineer the game.

 

That's like what happened with Blood and Warner Brothers / Atari.  It was only after Blood got reverse engineered that a source port was finally able to be made.

 

The fans always have to do it themselves.

[Dark Pulse]

4 hours ago, Panzermann11 said:

I'm just wondering where you got the info that they aren't working on the patch anymore.

You do know what "The studio was dissolved" means, right? That means there is no more Volition and everyone was told to find employment elsewhere.

 

How does a patch get made in those circumstances, again?

[SilverMiner]

What would stop former Volition members to team up with another name?

[MS-06FZ Zaku II Kai]

20 minutes ago, SilverMiner said:

What would stop former Volition members to team up with another name?

Probably lackof time/willpower and/or resources.

Plus there could be some copyright fuckery for all we know.

[Murdoch]

3 hours ago, Dark Pulse said:

How does a patch get made in those circumstances, again?

 

Yeah I am a bit perplexed by this question too. No studio, no patch. They won't even have access to the code and resources anymore.

Edited September 7, 2023 by Murdoch