247 replies to this topic

[Kyone Akashi]

Meh, the IP is just the game's title and its unique 'mech designs. Another company could "easily" create a new Battletech strategy game in a similar vein by getting a new license.

It's a shame, MWT really looked like it was on the right way for some time, and there were some spiffy ideas in it. On the other hand, I've never gotten used to its new designs (too "LEGO" for my taste), and neither did I appreciate its weird underlying card game system.

Like another user said, why can't someone just do Megamek in 3D? Sigh. Nowadays, everybody wants to reinvent the wheel. And that's why we get stuff like Master of Orion III.

Edited by Kyone Akashi, 03 December 2014 - 09:11 PM.

[Mal]

Anyone have a large sum of cash they're not using currently? If so, you can pick up the MWT assets via the current bankruptcy.

I didn't see this listing off the original link, but a little birdy pointed it out to me overnight:

http://raymondchabot...-for-sale/26192

Nothing in there (that I saw anyway) about us MWT Founders being sold as part of the package. So, I guess even if someone does pick it up, we may still end up being out of luck, and having to "re buy" (though, at this point, I personally would skip the founder's pack..and wait for launch, unless I really trust the studio that buys the assets).

[Vassago Rain]

RIP, MWT:

http://raymondchabot...-for-sale/26192

[Kyrie]

And this brings up the fascinating question of the licensing. As described by Russ himself in the Town Hall, the licensing was structured such that:

1) MS is the owner.
2) PGI is the primary licensee.
3) PGI awarded, under that authority of the original MS license, the sub-license for MWT.

Legally, that license is perhaps an "asset" that has basically been voided by the company going bankrupt. In other words, IGP has non-performed the contract under which the license was awarded, and if my interpretation is correct, PGI is free to do any of the following:

1) "Take back" the license and do their own MWT game (never going to happen but it is perhaps possible)
2) Award the license to a new developer.

Anyone have a stack of cash to make a deal with PGI? :-)

[MalodorousMonkey]

Yeah, at this point, IGP gets to run away with the money unfortunately. Glad I was turned off by the art style and never put any cash towards it.

[Heffay]

MalodorousMonkey, on 08 December 2014 - 09:27 AM, said:

Yeah, at this point, IGP gets to run away with the money unfortunately. Glad I was turned off by the art style and never put any cash towards it.

There was no money to run away with. That's what bankruptcy is. They ran out of money. Just a lot of red ink and office furniture.

[Kyrie]

Heffay, on 08 December 2014 - 09:29 AM, said:

There was no money to run away with. That's what bankruptcy is. They ran out of money. Just a lot of red ink and office furniture.

They took the money and used it for other purposes than what was expected until the money ran out.

[Heffay]

Kyrie, on 08 December 2014 - 10:14 AM, said:

They took the money and used it for other purposes than what was expected until the money ran out.

Paying bills isn't running away with the money.

[Kyrie]

Heffay, on 08 December 2014 - 10:59 AM, said:

Paying bills isn't running away with the money.

I do not mean to get into a debate about IGP's lack of ethics; I believe the point has been amply made that they took money under false pretenses. Everything after that is mostly irrelevant. Unless we go and look-up the court case in the Canadian bankruptcy court we will probably not get the relevant details of what was actually done. ;-)

Even with access to those documents it will likely be unclear what exactly happened.

While they may have used money to "pay bills", it is also quite possible that large chunks of it were taken out in other ways.

[Heffay]

Kyrie, on 08 December 2014 - 11:18 AM, said:

I do not mean to get into a debate about IGP's lack of ethics; I believe the point has been amply made that they took money under false pretenses.

We don't know that. They may have been trying to find a new developer until the day they stopped taking pre-orders.

[Kyrie]

Saw that someone actually linked the documents for the case filing. I am highly amused that 7G Entertainment is listed as a primary creditor for 16M.

As has been posted elsewhere, there is a long convoluted history on how IGP was funded to begin with.

[Heffay]

Kyrie, on 08 December 2014 - 11:27 AM, said:

Saw that someone actually linked the documents for the case filing. I am highly amused that 7G Entertainment is listed as a primary creditor for 16M.

As has been posted elsewhere, there is a long convoluted history on how IGP was funded to begin with.

As I understand there was only 1 secured creditor though, and I believe that was some Canadian union of some sort that was brought to our attention from a member of my unit. It was funny because there's a chance he may now be a partial owner of the MW:T IP. 7G may claim to be owed $16M, but they only get to go to the back of the line with the rest of the unsecured creditors.

And again, the fact that IGP failed doesn't mean they were up to shenanigans and designed to fail. They would have made far more money if all 3 of their games were successful.

[Kyrie]

Heffay, on 08 December 2014 - 11:22 AM, said:

We don't know that. They may have been trying to find a new developer until the day they stopped taking pre-orders.

Well, if you truly believe that.... then I am quite honestly surprised that anyone can be that credulous. I admit I am one of the many fools who went full-****** and got the biggest founder package with them, and that was back in 2012.

But the actual undisputed facts are damning beyond measure:

1) The hired Blue Lizard to develop the game, and fired them in 2013.
2) They kept the Blue Lizard logo on their website until people in this community began raising hell trying to figure out what was going on.
3) Throughout the entire period they said nothing at all to anyone about the state of the game.
4) During this period they were "hacking" their own game releasing old withdrawn elements, presumably an in-house activity to show that "something was being done".

So the damning part is, obviously, claiming someone you fired is still developing your game.

[Kyrie]

Heffay, on 08 December 2014 - 11:41 AM, said:

As I understand there was only 1 secured creditor though, and I believe that was some Canadian union of some sort that was brought to our attention from a member of my unit. It was funny because there's a chance he may now be a partial owner of the MW:T IP. 7G may claim to be owed $16M, but they only get to go to the back of the line with the rest of the unsecured creditors.

And again, the fact that IGP failed doesn't mean they were up to shenanigans and designed to fail. They would have made far more money if all 3 of their games were successful.

As far as I can tell, the only decent thing IGP did was divest itself from MWO and PGI. The funniest part is that, the third game, Sins of a Dark Age, is another example of how IGP got involved with the project and was bought out by the developer.

Ironclad games began developing the project and was either partnered up with IGP at the start or IGP became involved shortly thereafter. However, well before release, Ironclad decided to self-publish on Steam and became an "early access" title.

While we can only conjecture as to why they went this path, my personal interpretation is that Ironclad, like PGI, found IGP to be a bit difficult to work with. ;-)

[Heffay]

Kyrie, on 08 December 2014 - 11:43 AM, said:

Well, if you truly believe that.... then I am quite honestly surprised that anyone can be that credulous. I admit I am one of the many fools who went full-****** and got the biggest founder package with them, and that was back in 2012.

I actually think they were probably trying to sell the game, but couldn't find a buyer that would pay what they needed to pay the bills. And considering the bills they had even discounting the 7G stuff, it's not really surprising. There were enough signs early in 2014 that things weren't going well, with the IGP forum staff being laid off (Niko, miSs, Destined). My guess is that midway or even a bit earlier through the year they decided they weren't going to make it and started working on shutting down.

We can question the decision to continue to collect founder packages for MWT as to whether it was ethical, but since it was the only asset they had left, that would have effectively destroyed the only thing they had left of value. So it really is ethics in conflict; is it less ethical to continue to try to sell your only remaining asset while collecting founders packages (which may still be of value in the future), or do you stop paying vendors and providers even earlier? If you look at the list of unsecured creditors, a lot of people got hurt. But that's what bankruptcy does. A lot of people get hurt in the process, but it doesn't mean it's unethical to go bankrupt. It just means things didn't work out.

On the other hand, IGP failing is nothing but good news for MWO. Only the most hearty Island dwellers still believes that PGI is going to fail now. And there still are a few of them, writing bogus reviews on Looking Glass and raising the torches and pitchforks wherever they can.

[Kyrie]

Heffay, on 08 December 2014 - 12:18 PM, said:

I actually think they were probably trying to sell the game, but couldn't find a buyer that would pay what they needed to pay the bills. And considering the bills they had even discounting the 7G stuff, it's not really surprising. There were enough signs early in 2014 that things weren't going well, with the IGP forum staff being laid off (Niko, miSs, Destined). My guess is that midway or even a bit earlier through the year they decided they weren't going to make it and started working on shutting down.

We can question the decision to continue to collect founder packages for MWT as to whether it was ethical, but since it was the only asset they had left, that would have effectively destroyed the only thing they had left of value. So it really is ethics in conflict; is it less ethical to continue to try to sell your only remaining asset while collecting founders packages (which may still be of value in the future), or do you stop paying vendors and providers even earlier? If you look at the list of unsecured creditors, a lot of people got hurt. But that's what bankruptcy does. A lot of people get hurt in the process, but it doesn't mean it's unethical to go bankrupt. It just means things didn't work out.

On the other hand, IGP failing is nothing but good news for MWO. Only the most hearty Island dwellers still believes that PGI is going to fail now. And there still are a few of them, writing bogus reviews on Looking Glass and raising the torches and pitchforks wherever they can.

I wouldn't get too excited about IGP failing in terms of it being "good for MWO", there is, I feel still some potential backlash depending on how hard the "Fonds FTQ" wants to get its money back.

The last significant business decision IGP seems to have taken was the divestment of PGI/MWO. It was also the last legitimate serious asset they had.

While I am not a lawyer, nor a law student, I believe the Fonds FTQ would be will within its right to question that sale and the terms under which it was made as it impacts the borrower's ability to pay. It is also highly suspicious, in the sense that the divestment might be seen as a shield to protect PGI (where presumably most of the money went).

It is too convenient that:

1) IGP apparently made at least two bad investments, and one good one (Tactics, Sins on the Bad side) and PGI's MWO on the Good side.
2) IGP sells off interest in PGI/MWO.
3) IGP then declares bankruptcy.

"Oh, sorry Fonds FTQ, I can no longer pay back all that money I borrowed...."

[Heffay]

Kyrie, on 08 December 2014 - 12:40 PM, said:

I wouldn't get too excited about IGP failing in terms of it being "good for MWO", there is, I feel still some potential backlash depending on how hard the "Fonds FTQ" wants to get its money back.

The last significant business decision IGP seems to have taken was the divestment of PGI/MWO. It was also the last legitimate serious asset they had.

While I am not a lawyer, nor a law student, I believe the Fonds FTQ would be will within its right to question that sale and the terms under which it was made as it impacts the borrower's ability to pay. It is also highly suspicious, in the sense that the divestment might be seen as a shield to protect PGI (where presumably most of the money went).

It is too convenient that:

1) IGP apparently made at least two bad investments, and one good one (Tactics, Sins on the Bad side) and PGI's MWO on the Good side.
2) IGP sells off interest in PGI/MWO.
3) IGP then declares bankruptcy.

"Oh, sorry Fonds FTQ, I can no longer pay back all that money I borrowed...."

There's always the possibility of a clawback, but that could be hard to pull off. So many hoops to jump through, and it'll probably take years to affect PGI directly in the remote event that it actually happened. And even then, it would result in just a cash payment; it's not like they'd be able to claw back publishing rights.

PGI may have had a trump card in that they originally gave (or leased) the rights to IGP to be the publisher for MWO. It's possible that IGP was trying to sell the publishing rights to anyone else, but PGI said "eh, we'll just take back the rights if you do, so good luck with that." MWO is useless without the rights to develop it, and with those rights firmly in Russ's grip, IGP failing could have meant he could just take the publishing rights once IGP filed. And then what would Fonds do? Argue that they should have got more money for an asset they couldn't sell?

[Kyrie]

Heffay, on 08 December 2014 - 12:52 PM, said:

There's always the possibility of a clawback, but that could be hard to pull off. So many hoops to jump through, and it'll probably take years to affect PGI directly in the remote event that it actually happened. And even then, it would result in just a cash payment; it's not like they'd be able to claw back publishing rights.

PGI may have had a trump card in that they originally gave (or leased) the rights to IGP to be the publisher for MWO. It's possible that IGP was trying to sell the publishing rights to anyone else, but PGI said "eh, we'll just take back the rights if you do, so good luck with that." MWO is useless without the rights to develop it, and with those rights firmly in Russ's grip, IGP failing could have meant he could just take the publishing rights once IGP filed. And then what would Fonds do? Argue that they should have got more money for an asset they couldn't sell?

With apparently 12M at stake in unsecured debt, there is plenty at stake worth suing over. ;-)

While we cannot know what the terms of the original contract were between PGI and IGP, we can, for the sake of entertaining conjecture, posit the following based on what has been researched thus far:

1) 7G borrowed from the Fonds-FTQ and funded IGP with it (which is why there is an apparent double entry between 7G and the Fonds for similar amounts)
2) PGI and IGP signed a developer-publisher agreement where in PGI had "Creative Control" over development of the game, but IGP had the publishing rights which included:
2a) All pricing and marketing decisions
2b) A significant veto on overall development by controlling funding (to wit, Russ' statements on Town Hall and other events explaining delays in CW among other things).

The arrangement I would conjecture that existed is something along the lines of:

a) IGP funded development of MWO and other titles with the money secured from the Fonds
b) With IGP controlling the purse-strings for development, its likely that IGP would have "owned" a significant share of all revenues from MWO.
c) That revenue-share is what would have justified the loan to begin with.
d) We can conjecture that IGP, knowing it was about to go bankrupt, made a sweet-heart deal with PGI; likely to have been a one-time cash settlement against claims for all future revenues that was part of the original contract between them.

IMHO, at issue would be whether that final agreement between PGI and IGP represented a fair valuation for that "asset" -- the contract between them specifying the distribution of future revenues for the MWO product. At the very least, the Fonds should force disclosure via legal process of the details of the transactions in question to decide if pursuing further remedies are justified.

Edited by Kyrie, 08 December 2014 - 02:35 PM.

[Heffay]

It'll certainly be interesting to see if anything comes of it. I'm sure certain parties will be actively monitoring the situation and give instant feedback if this goes anywhere legally.

[Sandpit]

http://raymondchabot...-for-sale/26192

If I were a backer I'd seriously consider class action to get a return before everything is liquidated