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C Is For Credits And That’s Good Enough For Me
Mark Jacobs, EA VP and head of Mythic, had this to say about the Warhammer credits foo frah.
There is a fate reserved for those who betray the Emperor’s trust. It is not death. It is not life. What is it when flesh and mind are taken into the body of the Golden Throne? What is it when organs are absorbed slowly into the flesh of the living machine? Is there a mind that suffers for eons as the Emperor suffers, or does the personality fade and melt away as the flesh that houses it dissolves into nothing?
OK, he didn’t say that. But admit it – that’d be cool. He said this instead.
[Leaving the person out of the credits] could be a mistake. I’m not saying it’s not happening. I just don’t know who the heck this person is. So come out, stop hiding behind the anonymity of the internet and the legal shield of ‘I’m going to sue EA.’”
If the three years is correct, there’s only a few people it can be. But I don’t know if the three years is correct because I know who was working on it three years ago, and most of those people are still with the company. Maybe this person was fired from Mythic and they don’t want to say who they were publicly.
In some of the cases that people left, some of them hadn’t done a great job for us. Or some left just in a lurch. Do I feel badly for that? No, I don’t feel badly at all. I’m not going to shed a single tear for any of those guys.
So there you have it – the Mysterious Anonymous Ex-Mythic Developer sucked at his/her job, left them hanging, and should go public because Mark just wants to make things right.
So, as a few of you probably know, I left Mythic… about three years ago. HEY! Maybe the Immortal God Emperor is talking about ME! Hmm. Let’s break this down.
- Did leave Mythic in 2006, 2 1/2 years ago, as apparently did Mysterious Anonymous Ex-Mythic Developer (MAEMD). Hmm. This could be incriminating!
- Did not actually work on Warhammer, ever. Not even for a picosecond. I did harass Paul Barnett in a Chinese restaurant once. But I’m pretty sure that does NOT earn you a spot on the credits.
- Was not actually fired from Mythic. No, really! Although I hear the rumor mill since tells a different tale, which makes me quite amused. It’s hard to say WHAT that tale is though, because the most I ever hear about it is “YOU LEFT AND NO ONE TALKS ABOUT IT”. But, regardless, office drama also does not get you a spot on the credits, no matter how funny.
- Was a heretic in good standing, which means that under the Barnett Inquisition, I would have been burned AT THE STAKE while monks and executive producers would have chanted in Latin and PR filmed the whole thing for Youtube viral video distribution. Again, too cool for words, but still, didn’t actually happen.
So, short version: call off the Officio Assassinorum, it wasn’t me. (Which I’m pretty certain wasn’t ever seriously considered, but hey, it made for a funny blog post.) Plus, to be honest, when it comes to MMOs, credits just aren’t that big a deal. MobyGames is a joke (the only reason DAOC has ANY credits at all on there is because… um… I typed them in myself in 2003 so I could have SOMETHING credited there, back when I DID think it was a big deal) and everyone just uses LinkedIn anyway.
If you WOULD like to come out from the shadows and unmask yourself as a Secret Furious Ex-Mythic Uncredited Developer, feel free to do so in the comments! I mean, it would be a creditable thing to do.
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about 2 years ago
My guess is it’s a former Warden TL.
(NOTE: It’s an inside joke. If you’ve never been in the DAOC TL program you probably won’t get it)
about 2 years ago
People get left out of credits all the time, in all industries. It’s hardly ever a conspiracy! I’ve probably worked on 30 feature films as a post-production artist yet I think I only got credited in half of them, and only 4 or 5 show up in the IMDB. It happens. You move on.
about 2 years ago
I would like to take credit for being the uncredited dev. However claiming that I’ve ever worked in the industry is not a credible assertion, and should leave you feeling incredulous. I also have a low credit score.
Incredible!
about 2 years ago
@Jerid: If we’re dipping into the “Disgruntled ex-Team Lead” pool for probable suspects, this investigation could take a long, long, long, loooooooong time.
about 2 years ago
Games should totally have credits like on Lord of the Rings, where they thanked every fan on the Internet.
about 2 years ago
I’m Spartacus!
about 2 years ago
216 connections… nice. I only have 50 or so. Inerestingly, your a 3rd degree contact — which means we both know someone that knows the other person we know. Whee!!
about 2 years ago
2 degrees from me! But that’s just cause of J.
about 2 years ago
Yeah for disgruntled ex TLs, the list would have to be long.
Except I’m not disgruntled anymore!
about 2 years ago
It would have to be massive…
I gave up my gruntling a long time ago. I know lots of former TLs, the churn rate truly had to be seen to be believed.
about 2 years ago
Obviously it was Los Ortiz.
about 2 years ago
In my mind, leaving people off the credits is problematic in two ways. If someone poured a lot of effort into the game, I think they should be recognized. The real issue is where do you draw the line? The guy who dropped design suggestions to the team during lunch probably doesn’t deserve it. What about the programmer that was assigned to the project for a few months? What about the guy that worked on the project for years but had to move because his wife wanted to live closer to family after getting pregnant? I think, “Only those here when we write the credits” is too harsh.
The flip side of this, though, is that the industry lives by credits. The main reason most people even give me the time of day (when they do) is because of the games I have worked on. Mostly M59, but I’ve worked on a few other projects recently as I’ve done more consulting. Without those credits, we’re just assholes with websites and opinions. But, if you know that people have been left out of the credits, then it becomes harder to verify if someone did contribute to a project. If I get in a position where I want to hire people and they claim, “I worked on Warhammer for 10 months.”, I can’t verify it by firing up the game (or MobyGames, etc.) I have to call or email and maybe get a non-cryptic response back.
For some of us, credits are meaningless. Anyone disappointed that I don’t have my name in more credits before being willing to pay me is missing the point of my experience and expertise. Of course, there are plenty of those people.
Anyway, I think this policy is stupid for two reasons. After all, anything that makes me do more work makes me crankier.
about 2 years ago
In some of the cases that people left, some of them hadn’t done a great job for us. Or some left just in a lurch. Do I feel badly for that? No, I don’t feel badly at all. I’m not going to shed a single tear for any of those guys.
I think the appropriate response here is….Fuck Your Mother. If my work is in the game I deserve credit. And something tells me that when a 3 year employee quits you don’t systematically root out everything he’s done.
And if I left you in a lurch, again Fuck Your Mother. I’m an at will employee. I don’t have a contract that guarantees you’ll pay me until launch day therefor you don’t have a contract that guarantees I’ll be here until launch day.
I’m using the royal ‘I’ there, I’m not these guys.
about 2 years ago
Well, Mark Jacobs has alwalys been a giant a-hole, to put it nicely. What else is new? Not buying his game, even though I honestly love the Warhammer universe. It’s just too bad he had to end up in control of the MMO version. Kind of like with Raph and Star Wars…
about 2 years ago
Heh. You’re second degree for me. That seems to happen a lot with people via Dana Massey.
Anyhow, credits certainly seems to be an interesting issue – and a common issue at that. The IGDA has been making a big deal of it as well, and since this has become more public thanks to this little fiasco, it’ll be interesting to see what comes of it (if anything at all).
about 2 years ago
This actually just came up at work today. We just say if you’ve been with the project at least half the time, and for at least half its development, you’re in the credits. Anything less, and you’re not, just because you have to draw the line somewhere.
about 2 years ago
Not in the industry here, so I’m not understand why *time* should be the overriding requirement. Did you use the person’s idea, design, art, code, or other work product in the final version of the game? Yes? Then credit him or her, or remove that portion from the game. How could you justify doing otherwise?
about 2 years ago
Psychochild: I’m generally in agreement with you that there should be credits. But in terms of professionals verifying the work of other pros, it is HR’s legal obligation to confirm whether or not Person X worked at the company and for what time period. So if you need to know whether someone worked on a game, you can’t be 100% sure, but you can call and at least see that they worked at the developer for 2 years during the right time.
Robin: I agree with “work product” as a good metric, but ideas alone don’t cut it. They are weak sauce, as the kids say. That idea you had? Eh, somebody else probably would have thought of it. You just thought it first. However, if you were on the team, had an idea, and championed it to the leads, pushed it through into the final design of the game, that deserves a credit.
about 2 years ago
Yea man, like all ideas are like, wandering free and stuff. Like, they don’t really belong to any one person or principality. That’s why it’s like so bogus that I got sued for like just distributing them via the internet to a few thousand of my closest friends.
Some one would have made those movies and songs eventually, so who cares who did it first?
about 2 years ago
Personally, I’d like to give generous credits as much as possible.
Full credit for everyone who deserves it.
‘Additional XXXXX’ for anyone who falls below the ‘deserves it’ line
‘Special Thanks’ for anyone who farted in the general direction of the project.
I’ve been fortunate to not have a scenario where I would exclude someone from the credits – I can only think of a few (someone hostilely deleting a database, stealing from the office, something actually *severely harmful* to the project)
And choosing to leave, or being incompetent are not severely harmful.
about 2 years ago
I always thought credits were a joke that is the bone thrown to suckers instead of things like money.
As Darius said, even small companies can do the employment verification, and of course not only have to but are only allowed to give certain information. If game companies can’t do this as a matter of routine, where ever other industry can, I’d be pretty shocked.
about 2 years ago
“Did not actually work on Warhammer, ever. Not even for a picosecond. I did harass Paul Barnett in a Chinese restaurant once. But I’m pretty sure that does NOT earn you a spot on the credits.”
I’m pretty sure the above entitles you to a front page spot, and quite possibly your likeness on the cover doing something remotely connected to the point of the game.
about 2 years ago
In the pharmaceutical industry no one gets credit.
about 2 years ago
I’m pretty sure that the makers of Viagra don’t want people to know who they are, or to be able to find out where they live.
There’s alot of negative press associated with Drugs as well, it would definately bring as much bad as good.