No, not another "will there be thief4" thread, but... - by Flux
Zillameth on 21/7/2008 at 19:30
Games aren't announced officially until far into production process. Publisher needs to make sure everything's going fine first. For instance, the studio I work for has been working on their new game for about a year now, and a deal with publisher has been signed a few months ago. You won't hear about it in the news, though, one of reasons being the fact that there have been about a dozen major plot revisions since development started. Making any announcements or promises at this point would be a sure way to disappoint a lot of customers. In fact, I'm not allowed to even tell you who the publisher is, until it's made official.
The 'T' icon was a controlled leak, and you can be sure this kind of things is being done on purpose. In this case, they started recruiting for a new project more or less at the same time, so the message they sent was "come work for us, and you'll get to make a new Thief". While the general public has already forgotten about the event, people who applied to work there have not. It would be counterproductive for Eidos to deceive their prospective employees with false hopes. If they meant to hire people who don't care about what they are working on, they shouldn't have given any hints.
Myagi on 21/7/2008 at 23:16
Quote Posted by Zillameth
Publisher needs to make sure everything's going fine first.
Exactly, while there is no doubt they are working on thief, there's a long road ahead, the suits may see the prototype and think it sucks and/or doesn't give them enough $ sparkles in their eyes, or any other reason at any point in time for them to cancel a project. It's more comfortable to be able to make such decisions when no one knows about it.
Other factors like not starting PR campaigns too early, being able to "sell" exclusive announcements, or saving them for times and events where they have the biggest impact, probably also matter for games that have a publisher from day 0. I think very early announcements from devs in general, are games that have no publisher, and the developer want's to create some hype to get a deal.
Kin on 22/7/2008 at 05:04
Quote Posted by Zillameth
Games aren't announced officially until far into production process. Publisher needs to make sure everything's going fine first. For instance, the studio I work for has been working on their new game for about a year now, and a deal with publisher has been signed a few months ago. You won't hear about it in the news, though, one of reasons being the fact that there have been about a dozen major plot revisions since development started. Making any announcements or promises at this point would be a sure way to disappoint a lot of customers. In fact, I'm not allowed to even tell you who the publisher is, until it's made official.
The 'T' icon was a controlled leak, and you can be sure this kind of things is being done on purpose. In this case, they started recruiting for a new project more or less at the same time, so the message they sent was "come work for us, and you'll get to make a new Thief". While the general public has already forgotten about the event, people who applied to work there have not. It would be counterproductive for Eidos to deceive their prospective employees with false hopes. If they meant to hire people who don't care about what they are working on, they shouldn't have given any hints.
It seems you know what you talking about Zillameth. I am somewhat relieved now that i see the "t" leak is probably controled and not something hapend by accident.
Dia on 22/7/2008 at 19:42
Quote Posted by Zillameth
The 'T' icon was a controlled leak, and you can be sure this kind of things is being done on purpose. In this case, they started recruiting for a new project more or less at the same time, so the message they sent was "come work for us, and you'll get to make a new Thief". While the general public has already forgotten about the event, people who applied to work there have not. It would be counterproductive for Eidos to deceive their prospective employees with false hopes. If they meant to hire people who don't care about what they are working on, they shouldn't have given any hints.
The part that bothers me is that Eidos could possibly be deliberately deceiving everyone: prospective employees who sign up thinking they're going to get to work on a new Thief project as well as gamers like us who're hoping beyond hope that the 'T' icon wasn't just a mistake.
I never have & never will trust large corporations, regardless of the products they peddle.
:nono:
Zillameth on 22/7/2008 at 20:25
Quote Posted by Dia
The part that bothers me is that Eidos could possibly be deliberately deceiving everyone: prospective employees who sign up thinking they're going to get to work on a new Thief project as well as gamers like us who're hoping beyond hope that the 'T' icon wasn't just a mistake.
I never have & never will trust large corporations, regardless of the products they peddle.
That's very reasonable. Companies like Eidos aren't in this business for the sake of games or gamers, and their world doesn't revolve around any particular "franchise". This puts them exactly opposite to the position of a typical fan. And yes, the way marketing people abuse fandom communities can be somewhat ruthless.
However, there are useful lies and stupid lies. This one would seem like the latter. I just cannot see any profit they could get from this, so either the person who's made a leak is an idiot, or they are being serious. Thief is one of those series that earned a lot of prestige in the industry, so if Eidos damage this brand, they will severely damage their public image as a result. Judging by their overall status, it's not something they can afford.
nicked on 23/7/2008 at 11:27
Eidos could "afford" to release a game called Thief 4: The Shit Project and have it about some guy in the far future called Gareth who breaks into people's homes to poo on their furniture. And if they thought it would sell, they'd be making it right now. They'd only damage their public image with hardcore Thief fans I'm afraid, there aren't enough of us to make any kind of dent in their general public image and frankly, most are suspicious of big corporations like Eidos anyway. They've not got enough to lose to stop them trying to make a Thief 4 in the shape of a big cash sponge.
pavlovscat on 23/7/2008 at 17:20
Quote Posted by nicked
Thief 4: The Shit Project and have it about some guy in the far future called Gareth who breaks into people's homes to poo on their furniture.
HUSH!!! Don't give them any ideas!! :rolleyes: :laff:
Beleg Cúthalion on 23/7/2008 at 20:12
Actually that's a very old thievy tradition.
But I have the feeling that there will be a trend towards higher-quality games (or at least a division between them and the "usual crap"), simply because people won't be satisfied sooner or later. And I think Thief doesn't have a number of players which is higher than the number of the real fans; thus ignoring them (us) would not make sense at all because we are the ones who must buy it if anyone. Maybe I'm overestimating things/humans, but unless proven otherwise...
Zillameth on 23/7/2008 at 21:44
The issue I was addressing was wether or not they are making a new Thief. Whether or not it's going to be a good game is a completely different question. It could go wrong for many reasons, publisher greed being one of your lesser concerns.
Public image is a much more complicated issue than just reception of your products. For instance, EA are very, very rich, and they have big revenues, but their public image is poor. This has different meaning for gamers and for professionals. Gamers care most about things like product quality and price, copy protection, customer support, and so on. A professional, on the other hand, will think twice before they apply for a job at the company that created EA Spouse. Did you know EA lost a class action lawsuit that cost them almost 15 million USD? This kind of failures doesn't make a company like EA go bankrupt, but it does make a certain impression on shareholders. Namely, there is concern that the company might have some more dirty laundry that could prove costly to wash.
Eidos haven't been doing well financially in the last ten years. Their brands are their biggest asset now. They did try to capitalize on them in a straightforward way (that is, by adapting them to the lowest common denominator), and they failed miserably with such brands as Tomb Raider, Thief and Deus Ex. Not to mention the infamous Daikatana. So this approach doesn't work for them and I'm inclined to suspect they know it.
imperialreign on 27/7/2008 at 06:38
finally heard of this T4 rumor through the underground . . . drew me out of seclusion . . .
I think this quip from 1up:
Quote:
Furthering the speculation, Eurogamer reports (via Kotaku) that studio head Stephane D'Astous temporarily changed his FaceBook profile picture to a slashed image of the "T" from the Thief logo. When asked by Eurogamer whether they would flatly state Thief 4 is in the works, Eidos declined to comment.
is a good give away, and many points are looking like T4 is defi a possiblity . . .
but, trying not to get the hopes up too much, y'know? just in case . . .
hopefully, though, if it
does happen, it'll still be set in The City and not be set in some "modern" style world . . . that would seriously be an injust insult to the many taffers out there
let's see how this goes, though . . .
