Future of THQ is in question...

I'd say thats a pretty big win for Sega. From what I read Bethesda came .3 mil short. Company of Heroes 2 is going to be huge for them.

I know Darksiders itself didn't sell well, but as I said, the quality of the game was still high.

I look at it like this. You get started in film, and your name begins to carry weight. Guillermo del Toro has gained enough traction that people are willing to throw money at him to make Pacific Rim. Why? He's a talented director. Edgar Wright made Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, all films that were not big money makers (or in Scott Pilgrim's case, a loss) and yet Edgar Wright is now able to do Marvel's Ant Man. Peter Jackson going from small niche movies to Lord of the Rings. Hell, Neil Blomkamp was being given the Halo movie and he had only done short films.

Darksiders didn't sell, but that could have been marketing's fault. The games themselves were still good, and the name Vigil should mean something.

But as pointed out, that's not how this business works. Instead everyone is more interested in IP, even though we've seen time and time again how little that can be worth over time (see: Medal of Honor once being a valuable IP, or the horrible wreckage that is Star Fox after being tossed by a variety of studios).

ccesarano wrote:

Yeah, report on GamesBeat I read says Vigil couldn't find a buyer. I know we all have our "Is it any good?" jokes here, but at the very least when I played both Darksiders 1 and Darksiders 2 I found games with a large pool of content, a variety of good game design choices and a lot more polish than a single Bethesda game has ever walked out of the door with (unless you count Dishonored, which they merely published).

That no one would want to buy the developer is just...that's horrible, horrifying, and makes me wonder what the priorities of the people buying really are. It is one thing to lose the Darksiders IP. I can stand possibly never getting a third (I am, after all, a fan of Republic Commando and Metal Arms, two games that deserved sequels). But to lose a studio of clearly talented and passionate people...

I really, really hope they can find a buyer.

We clearly played different games, I found it dull with pointless repetitive combat. It's only good ideas it stole from other better games.

TempestBlayze wrote:

I'd say thats a pretty big win for Sega. From what I read Bethesda came .3 mil short. Company of Heroes 2 is going to be huge for them.

Uh, possibly? From what I understand, the 40k series is what has been a huge seller for Relic, and the original COH didn't even break even until the second expansion.

So if anything, the developers at Vigil shouldn't be using their skills on Darksiders, but on other games. As I see it, hopefully the developers get hired under other roofs and this happens.

Darksiders itself isn't much of a brand, it's one very distinct thing (I don't see how you can diversify it), and I imagine takes a lot of effort to make one 'run' of the Darksiders product, so you can't quickly churn them out, but it doesn't have the lucrative pay-off. A Darksiders game isn't a big event, it's just a nice game that gets lost in the mix of a crowd of other nice games.

I know it's a meme here, but I'm trying to think of outstanding redeeming characteristics of Darksiders and I just can't do it. There's lots of "well that bit was kind of good", but nothing I can say "it had really awesome...".

ccesarano wrote:

Darksiders didn't sell, but that could have been marketing's fault. The games themselves were still good, and the name Vigil should mean something.

But as pointed out, that's not how this business works. Instead everyone is more interested in IP, even though we've seen time and time again how little that can be worth over time (see: Medal of Honor once being a valuable IP, or the horrible wreckage that is Star Fox after being tossed by a variety of studios).

I don't know if your analogy about directors holds. Seems to me that if they maybe aren't interested in the Darksiders IP, they could still be interested in picking up key developers (and would be able to do so more cheaply because they can just target the individuals who they have the most faith in).

I'll miss THQ. I remember going to CES and E3 ,and seeing them back when they only turned out licensed shovelware but were trying to transition into better more interesting games.

Volition (studio) and Saints Row (IP)
Winning bid: $22.3 million - Koch Media GmbH (Deep Silver)
Backup bidder: $5.4 million - Ubisoft

Any thoughts on the valuation differences between Koch and Ubisoft's bids? Seems like quite a huge gulf there and I'm surprised to see no one else jumped in on it.

Oh, another thought: does this mean that the Metro 2033 sequel is dead? It looks like Koch only bought the license?

Malor wrote:
shoptroll wrote:
ccesarano wrote:

According to Destructoid, Homefront 2 went to Crytek for $500,000.

For that much money the fans could've kickstarted that purchase.

That would only work if there were fans.

Glad Relic did so well. I really like those guys/gals. Hope they're happy at Sega. Creative Assembly seems to be doing very good work (Shogun II was awesome), so hopefully it'll work out okay. If Bethesda had bought them, I would have feared for the quality of their games... Bethesda does some interesting stuff, but QA is not their strong suit.

So, I guess we now have a final answer to "Is Darksiders any good?" because nobody wanted the studio OR the IP. The other companies apparently felt Darksiders was worth zero dollars. That's the kind of question that's hard to answer definitively, and I'd argue that this is about as close as we'll ever get. The answer, it would seem, isn't just "No," but "Hah! As if."

It might be cheaper to hire the individual devs than buying the studio, if there was no interest in the franchise itself.

Keep in mind that a bid has to be accepted. Darksiders isn't work zero dollars. I wish it worked that way, I'd buy the IP just to say I own it.

shoptroll wrote:
ccesarano wrote:

According to Destructoid, Homefront 2 went to Crytek for $500,000.

For that much money the fans could've kickstarted that purchase.

That would only work if there were fans.

Glad Relic did so well. I really like those guys/gals. Hope they're happy at Sega. Creative Assembly seems to be doing very good work (Shogun II was awesome), so hopefully it'll work out okay. If Bethesda had bought them, I would have feared for the quality of their games... Bethesda does some interesting stuff, but QA is not their strong suit.

So, I guess we now have a final answer to "Is Darksiders any good?" because nobody wanted the studio OR the IP. The other companies apparently felt Darksiders was worth zero dollars. I'd argue that this is about as close to a definitive answer to that question as we'll ever get... and that answer isn't just "No," but "Hah! As if."

It might be cheaper to hire the individual devs than buying the studio, if there was no interest in the franchise itself.

Malor wrote:

Oh, another thought: does this mean that the Metro 2033 sequel is dead? It looks like Koch only bought the license?

That's because THQ never owned the studio making it to begin with. It's possible they won't use the 4A Games to finish the game, but considering it is almost complete, that would be doubtful.

Ah, I understand, thanks. Hopefully it'll ship on schedule.

I think we need a new thread title the next time captain checks this thread.

I'm disappointed that Darksiders hasn't found a buyer. I didn't play the sequel, but the first game felt like it had a lot of potential to be a really solid franchise.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

I'm disappointed that Darksiders hasn't found a buyer. I didn't play the sequel, but the first game felt like it had a lot of potential to be a really solid franchise.

Did it?

I'm guessing this is more legal speak than anything, but if this is how it sounds...

No.

No. No. No. No. NO. NO. NO. NO. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/23/390...

Scratched wrote:

So if anything, the developers at Vigil shouldn't be using their skills on Darksiders, but on other games. As I see it, hopefully the developers get hired under other roofs and this happens.

Darksiders itself isn't much of a brand, it's one very distinct thing (I don't see how you can diversify it), and I imagine takes a lot of effort to make one 'run' of the Darksiders product, so you can't quickly churn them out, but it doesn't have the lucrative pay-off. A Darksiders game isn't a big event, it's just a nice game that gets lost in the mix of a crowd of other nice games.

I know it's a meme here, but I'm trying to think of outstanding redeeming characteristics of Darksiders and I just can't do it. There's lots of "well that bit was kind of good", but nothing I can say "it had really awesome...".

As I said, I'm used to IP going away. If Darksiders died today I'd be sad, but I'd be willing to part with it as long as Vigil could continue to exist. Even if it meant their next project was "we want to shove another title in this popular franchise out the door. What can you do with it?" Because at least their talent would be put to use.

Agent 86 wrote:

We clearly played different games, I found it dull with pointless repetitive combat. It's only good ideas it stole from other better games.

Firstly, this is because Darksiders isn't God of War, and if you were playing it for combat then you were missing at least half the experience. And, quite frankly, it is possible you sucked at it. As for "only good ideas stolen from other better games", how come we can have FPS and RTS games that are 90% the same as every other game in their genre, but the second you imitate Zelda you're stealing?

f*ck this industry. I need a God damn mother f*cking drink. Or seven.

Does this thread need to get into the whole Darksiders fight again? Please no. Can we agree that the games weren't big money makers without getting into fights about if they were good or not?

Soooo... what's the minimum bid to get the Darksiders IP? Can I offer them 5 bucks for it?

SuperDave wrote:

I'm guessing this is more legal speak than anything, but if this is how it sounds...

No.

No. No. No. No. NO. NO. NO. NO. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/23/390...

http://nooooooooooooooo.com/

So I had to look up who Deep Silver and Koch Media even are. Their games list is....interesting. Are they a strictly a publish house or do they do their own game development also?

Agent 86 wrote:

So I had to look up who Deep Silver and Koch Media even are. Their games list is....interesting. Are they a strictly a publish house or do they do their own game development also?

From the looks of it, they're just a publisher.

MannishBoy wrote:

Does this thread need to get into the whole Darksiders fight again? Please no. Can we agree that the games weren't big money makers without getting into fights about if they were good or not?

This one wasn't my fault. I just want that to be on the record.

I have $4000 in my bank account. Maybe I'll make a phone call and then anyone who wants to make a new Red Faction game will have to go through me.

Nei wrote:

Sigh... the news about Vigil really blows! I might be in minority, but I thought the 'Darksiders' series was pretty good, heck the first game was awesome.

I've heard it's good. Haven't played it yet, though.

LockAndLoad wrote:
Volition (studio) and Saints Row (IP)
Winning bid: $22.3 million - Koch Media GmbH (Deep Silver)
Backup bidder: $5.4 million - Ubisoft

Any thoughts on the valuation differences between Koch and Ubisoft's bids? Seems like quite a huge gulf there and I'm surprised to see no one else jumped in on it.

I would also be interested in finding out the big difference in price gap.

kuddles wrote:

I have $4000 in my bank account. Maybe I'll make a phone call and then anyone who wants to make a new Red Faction game will have to go through me.

Space Asshole Studios?

Bonnonon wrote:

I would also be interested in finding out the big difference in price gap.

My guess is Deep Silver really wanted to get that studio, so they made their opening bid high in the hopes to show they're serious.

So I'm really curious to see what happens to Relic. Sega better do right by them and make Company of Heroes 2 even better.