RPG Codex Review

There's a lot this author gets very right... and few things that are plainly wrong. I am left with a distinct impression there is something disingenuous going on.

Personally I would say the quests are a little less horrible, and combat a little more horrible. But that's just me.

The "money grab" angle is really tired though, and I wish people would just do some simple maths before they run their mouths (or fingers as the case may be) about financials.

It doesn't take a very sophisticated understanding of business and accounting to realize that Port needed at least a couple million a year to operate. $1.9 million could never have funded 5 years of development, much less 5 episodes. It's just simply a matter of people paying their rents and feeding themselves... you know.. recurring expenses.

As a contributor through SeedInvest, I'd be more interested to hear arguments for or against if they were adequately financially "vetted" though SeedInvest, considering it is less than a year since that funding closed. However I recall something being mentioned about marketing dollars getting spent that didn't bring in the promised returns.

Sort of how it complains about the game, the review is rather sprawling and unwieldy. I think it would read much better, and even be more biting if that was the intention, if they pulled out all the whining about money and RMT.

We don't live in a fantasy world, and so the real, flesh and blood, people who work(ed) at Portalarium tend to need to pay their rents, food bills, transportation, communications, etc. just like anybody else.

Richard would be the only one who might be financially independent, but it's certainly not because the backers are funding his lifestyle. I might suggest speculating about his wife... the real life investment banker... instead of making disparaging remarks about her likeness in the game. But I digress...

It makes absolutely no sense, whatsoever, to criticize a crowdfunded project, for looking to ways to fund from the crowd.

Nobody ever promised that $1.9 million would fund the entire company throughout the whole development of this game. Whoever believes that is believing in a fantasy they made up in their minds, and its not Portalarium's responsibility to fulfill this wild fantasy where $1.9 million pays a full time staff of 30-50 people for more than 5 years.

 

I really agree with this. I was kind of indifferent to the extreme moderation years ago - but now it's not a good sign or practice. If someone is cursing someone out or just being a total a$$ - then sure, moderate. But just because you have a post of people using CONSTRUCTIVE criticism - out of love and concern for this game - why close the thread? Is that really a wise business practice? Why not let the thread continue and as a dev, take notes and take heed of what the criticisms are. It may just save the game, bring a lot of old players back and bring a lot of new players in.

 

Totally agree. The RMT nor the sota store never bothered me. It was always vanity items and didn't really impact the game.

It just makes me wonder if there was "scope creep" that kept this game in development for 5 plus years with, so far, not much to show for it. I kept wondering why they kept expanding and expanding things.. POTs for example. It sounded like a cool idea .. but maybe they should have just kept to the plan and kept with a nice and engaging story. Made the cities and towns smaller with nice and engaging NPCs. It could have been smaller, I think, with the budget they had.
I know, hindsight is 20/20.. but I was always scratching my head that they kept on developing new things when those things could have been pushed back to Episode 2. Now we have an unfinished , unpolished game with so many broken things. A shame.

 

I would tend to agree with your view, but would add that I think the cause is known: it's selective hearing.

They have done a great job of listening to backers and players who wanted this or that thing added to the game. But they did a poor job of listening to the backers and players who were raising red flags about the substandard story and questing system, and overly buggy combat.

 

Yes, big +1

 

The wife that is or was listed as an employee of Port?

And..
13 mil you mean?

I dont think anyone expected kickstarter to fund the project to completion... sale of the game alone would come after..
But i think its reasonable for people to expect thr 1.9 mil which KICKSTARTED and led into 13 mil to lead into more then the initial 1.9 .
..

 

Sol, hate to put it to you, but after five years, "they are a day late and dollar short" should have listened to the reviews and "input" long before this ship sank. In my opinion.

 

Well I'm sorry you feel that way. I understand though.

 

I don't think the ship has sank. I DO think it's okay to continue supporting the game. I think we are getting pretty deep into this conversation and it's causing a lot of anxiety for everyone. A lot of doubt. But these threads and reviews give everyone an opportunity to express their opinions to help fix issues, not give up. It is of course everyone's free will and choice to either support or not. But everyone's feedback in this thread has been awesome, the good and the bad. That's how you fix problems. There's a culture out there who do business by sitting around in meetings, yelling at each other their ideas and opinions. They have shouting matches and intense heated debates. Then they pack up and go home and are happy and proud with the idea they fought for. There's nothing wrong with making a bit of noise, but not for the sole purpose of who can be the biggest *******. For the purpose of actually fixing something. This is not the time to give up.

 

I agree. The problem was.. most threads like this woulda have been locked 4 pages ago.

It shouldnt feel like a * surprise * to me its even still open.

 

TRUE! I agree with that. I don't think those things were handled very well. But I am glad they have made the choice to leave these open. I think it will produce a lot of good conversation and debate that will bring things out into the light a bit more. I think it will help our relationship with the devs as well as weird as that may sound to everyone. Sometimes you gotta fight with each other to get the big stuff out on the table.

 

Ill be honest.. i feel like because theres no Community manager ... with.. orders to i dunno what..

W ell w.e
I wont get into my opinion.. but moderation seems dif in the last week... right at layoffs.

 

Ummm...not to go off topic but has anyone else read the comments for this review? I mean...it's hilarious and completely unhinged at the same time. There's talk of a turtle farm scam, multiple alts, and all kinds of crazy! I can't keep half of it straight but the banter is highly comical!

 

It made me cringe just reading the comments from that totally crazy English guy whose name we all know. The comments on the review show how sad some online gaming communities are. Would any of the commenters talk to other human beings like this, face to face? I think not.

 

Erm... that's exactly what Port promised in the Kickstarter campaign. Remember they pitched it as funding episode 1, which would release in 2014, sales of which would help fund the following episodes. That was the original promise.

Not at all realistic? We know that now of course, although I think scope creep played a large part in that. But regardless of what we know now, you can't just blame all kickstarters for what port promised and tell us we should have known better than to beleive what they said.

 

I really don't think that was the promise, and I didn't find any evidence to support such a claim.

I would be very interested to see any communication you received that says otherwise.

This is what I did find:

"Why do you need my money?

Richard has already invested several million dollars in the game and will almost certainly invest more before we ship. We would have to have a record setting campaign to match what Richard already invested in the company. But there is no reason to suggest that we can't also raise money from the community we are making the game for to get them involved too. 100% of the money raised in the Kickstarter will go to make a better game and the community involvement is a huge bonus for US."

As it says, Richard put in millions of his own money. So right there you can see how the author of this review is just trying to be incendiary making claims that backer's money basically just went to fund his lifestyle.

I will grant that the initial money raised should have lasted at least to the originally proposed Launch date, and I believe that it did.

But people expecting such a relatively small pile of cash to continue funding the studio for years beyond that... And all the way through Episode 5... Is just really thoughtless and absurd.

And yes... I've argued with people on this forum who believe the Kickstarter was billed as funding for all 5 episodes.

And got moderated for it too. Ostensibly because I didn't tell someone they were an idiot in the nicest way possible.

As for game sales alone funding the project post-Launch, again let's just do the math. How many times does 40 go into 2,000,000? 50,000 times. So that's 50K+ new accounts per year just to keep the lights on.

Theoretically possible? Perhaps. But anyone with half their wits about them could easily see that was nowhere near happening at any time.

But really that's not the point. The point is the incessant browbeating they take for simply trying to run a business.

The money needs to come from somewhere. I don't know how many other gaming studios start with millions of seed money from a founder, but of all things, this effort should be praised.

If anything, it just underscores the naivety of crowdfunding projects, since many people just simply do not understand their own personal finances, much less business finance.

The problem is in allowing people to contribute money that they couldn't really afford to lose. But that isn't something specific to Port, but just the nature of crowdfunding in general.

None of it really belongs in a proper review of the game.

Implying Richard's space trip was funded by game backers. Railing on and on about the Add-On store. Crying because Port (wisely) chose not to squander their limited resources banning, and policing, RMT.

These complaints are all the hallmarks of a person who has no idea what they are talking about when it comes to financing a game, and it causes their whole review to fall under question.

It's just really a poorly written review, despite getting a lot right about the half-finished state of the game. They should have left it in the comments section.

 

Are they actually players? I haven't read that far yet so I couldn't tell lol.

 

I am assuming Richard only has one wife...? But yeah, what's with the ripping on Arabella? Somebody jealous? Lol

Also...

Spoiler

That castle in Brittany does not belong to Lord British. And there is also a recurring theme in his games of "not being present" when his people need him the most.

Sadly, some did. And they're still out there acting all scorned and embittered about it.

As to 13 mil. Yup, sounds about the right amount considering how long they've been in business and their burn rate.

I think we are on the same page. Kickstarter is what it says it is... To help "kickstart" projects. It was never intended to fund every project all the way through to completion.

It is a crowdfunding vehicle, no more or less. Companies end up needing additional rounds of funding they didn't originally anticipate all the time. It's common.

Dunno how much of that was wasted on the failed marketing campaign. But that kind of thing happens a lot too. It sucks, but unfortunately part of business.

 

Well, originally they were to get a SP game and the money was to help fund it. I could understand if you spent, say $1,000 on it, and now you didn't get what you thought you were by reading their language.

 

I don't really envy the fact that you have that much time to read over 200 comments of that review. The review alone took forever to read and basically regurgitated the same negative stances you find in all of the other poorly written reviews.

Are there no other complaints that have been shared? It's time that we can take those grievances and work on fixing them.