Why make the Settlement announcement, when ...

[Nalrach]

[quote=TheHaunt]About 6 weeks ago, I was very excited to try coming back to Horizons. Publicity about Settlements and some of the things I'd read about improvements to dragons and other things made me want to come back (after an absence of about 1.5 years).[quote]

That makes me think .. didn't David said ""they consider selling starting spring 2006""

Then why giving hope to players with a big project, when you know your selling?

I too returned because of the settlement and the lair?

So far I'm decieved with lair 10 time has hard has building same type of room that would take me as a byped to build same type house. And with the sale and going back to the same situation when Tulga bought the game .. I too seriously wonder of my future.

Rigth now I feel like betrayed by Tulga and by them giving us false hope.

[Chaldor Itieles]

Maybe they didn't know at that time of announcement that hz will be going to be selled.

[Deth]

Because to sale something you have to make it look nice and sound attractive. Have you ever seen the commercial of the car in the hurricane flooded with water. Texts started appearing as typed at the bottom of the screen. "Slight water dama" Text deleted. The appears as "Has new upholstery."

That is what happened here they wante dthe game to look good and get people back so they could sale the game and maybe get a better price.

Edit:

Maybe they didn't know at that time of announcement that hz will be going to be selled.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Helcat]

Think about your question. Put yourself in Tulga's shoes.
Then use simple logic. The answer is quite apparent.

[Dravatar]

Didn't know for sure? quite possibly.

Had absolutely no inkling that something was in the works? very doubtful.

Hoped that the rumors were not true? probably.

That is for the TG employees. The owners probably knew (as in had decided on a course of action) a while back.

[Theolaerynn]

I have posed this exact question a few days ago in another thread. The timing does seem to be quite odd.

I think the consensus is 'Business is Business'. I think we got the business all right.

[Vlisson]

yes i think so too

it has been only a marketing gag

i got very frustrated when i read about the status of the expansion

[Varangaard]

The attempt to affect sales price with the Settlements expansion doesn't quite ring true. The sales decision was made by mr. Baker and he probably had a price in mind already. The decision to create the Settlements expansion was made by the staff, David Bowman et al. Whether or not it increased the sales price by making the game look better or attracted more subscribers did not affect them one bit. None of them had ownership in company and thus the sales price was completely irrelevant to them. (edit: It strikes me that mr. Baker may have forced the announcement, since he is the only person who gained anything from the sale.) The expansion was announced at E3, so it had been in planning before that - possibly started even before their owner decided to sell. The first meeting of Tulga and EI was also at E3, and it was said that the meeting was short. Also, since TG staff had no stake in comany, it is unlikely they were part of the actual sales discussion. Most likely, they had no better idea in the days following E3.

Personally, I wouldn't see any of the above events as a good enough reason not to announce the expansion. On the other hand, if they did know that a sales was final, inked and signed well before E3, th announcement would sound premature. Regardless, I fail to see what 'advantage' they were trying to achieve with the announcement even if they did know. Maybe they were hoping their new owner - which they did not meet before E3 - would pick the ball and run with it. If they were hoping for that, [snip - I spoke too much], their hope was most likely in vain.

[Helcat]

The attempt to affect sales price with the Settlements expansion doesn't quite ring true.

It does ring true if you expand your thinking a bit,
and contemplate some of the more "creative"
sales prices scenarios which may or may not have
been a part of the deal. Nuff said on that.

[Varangaard]

Creative or not, I'm simply applying Occam's Razor to this scenario.

[Helcat]

Occam's Razor most definitely applies, if you do as I suggested.

[Nalrach]

Maybe they didn't know at that time of announcement that hz will be going to be selled.

Like I said ... From David comment at
David Bowman Q&A Regarding The Sale
http://rpgvault.ign.com/articles/721/721974p1.html

"" made a decision to attempt to sell Horizons in the spring of 2006.""

Defending David at this time is 'in my book" a blindfoldman belief. But I may give a doubt belief, on the lower level of the development team not to be in the investor secret's. In any case David always been secretive to exact details on the settlement scenario, just vague info. So permit me to have my reserve on the seriousness of the settlement project. Today, in ligth of various fact, it does seems like a sale scam. For the sake of Tulga team and their honor, I hope that EI does bring it out, so we do believe that the ground work was done by Tulga team.

Sorry to often we had good new to be decieved afterwards, and seeing good friends and dedicated user leaving, makes this a tough situation to stay true to HZ.

[Varangaard]

Nalrach, I can see in light of past events there is plenty of reason not to fully trust TG, but... did you read what I wrote, at all? Even further, if the allegations are true that Horizons was sold 'for peanuts' there is even less reason to believe that the Settlements was used to boost sales price. I still see absolutely no evidence, or anything even remotely suggesting that it would have been a 'sale scam'.

As I've covered already, they most likely knew Horizons had been put up for sale by their big boss, back when they were developing Settlements... and so what? You expect them to stop working just because their product is changing ownership on management level? I didn't see that happening during AE-TG transition... of course the difference here is that EI decided not to take the dev team aboard. I believe the correct question in this regard is one directed at EI, querying why they killed development (of most everything, not just the Settlements) by not picking up the ex-TG team.

[Helcat]

Nalrach, I can see in light of past events there is plenty of reason not to fully trust TG, but... did you read what I wrote, at all? Even further, if the allegations are true that Horizons was sold 'for peanuts' there is even less reason to believe that the Settlements was used to boost sales price.

because you are still not thinking creatively enough

[Menkure]

There was a lot of work done on the design doc for The Settlements, and it was hoped that the presentation of it to Mr. Baker would convince him not to sell Horizons. It was not made solely to draw in new subscriptions.

No one was trying to pull the wool over anyone's eyes.. not even Mr. Baker's. Tulga had the artists and the ability to make it happen... therefore it wasn't a scam, even to him.

That's the bottom line. That's the truth... take it or leave it. If you don't believe me, then that's your fault.


((bolded things so people would see them, since a lot of people here are turning a blind eye to the truth ))