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Post by Morreion on Jul 23, 2009 18:25:14 GMT -5
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Post by Loendal on Sept 17, 2009 10:51:14 GMT -5
Played Jumpgate for a while, it's not bad. It's no Earth and Beyond, but it's ok
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Post by Morreion on Jul 31, 2013 14:10:36 GMT -5
Whatever happened to Jumpgate Evolution? Hint: if a game studio goes from lots of information to total silence for months, it's not good. Jumpgate: Evolution (Wikipedia)Jumpgate Evolution, commonly abbreviated as JGE, is an unreleased massively multiplayer online game having been in development by NetDevil intended to be published by Codemasters. The game is a sequel to Jumpgate: The Reconstruction Initiative and features a new graphics engine, all new assets and more accessible game play.
Originally scheduled for a June 2009 release, it has since been delayed.
Official information about the game is no longer being released. NetDevil's website is no longer online, and the owner Gazillion Entertainment does not mention the game on their website. All of NetDevil's employees not working on the LEGO Universe project were laid off in February 2011, at which time the game was effictively terminated. As of July 2012 or before, the website for the game has been shut down.Oh my! A Jumpgate Evolution leak -- not really (Massively)Now, after months of quiet, we have some Jumpgate Evolution footage! Take a look after the break at this "leaked" real footage of gameplay of the citadel.Codemasters files suit over Jumpgate Evolution delays (Massively)We have all been waiting for Jumpgate Evolution for quite some time, but perhaps no one quite as much as Codemasters. As a matter of fact, the company is so tired of waiting on the game to come out that it's decided to file a civil complaint against Netdevil and its parent company Gazillion Entertainment for the delays in publishing the eagerly anticipated sci-fi space shooter.
While the announcement on Codemasters' official Jumpgate Evolution site doesn't offer anything beyond the generic "yes, we did this, here's what court we filed it in, no other comment at this time" statement, the court document itself makes for interesting (if dry) reading. Essentially, Codemasters charges that Netdevil failed to meet contractual guidelines, which called for the studio to ship the game by February 24th, 2009. During that time, Codemasters paid almost 1.4 million USD to Netdevil to help underwrite the game's development and for "art assets." Codemasters is also seeking compensation due to setting up servers, website, community team, etc. for the European version of Jumpgate Evolution. Ultimately, it boils down to a pretty standard breach of contract that offers Codemasters' share of interest back to Netdevil and Gazillion in return for all monies invested in the project to date. Whether or not this brouhaha will cause any changes to the timetable for Jumpgate Evolution will remain to be seen. We'll keep an eye out as the case progresses. NetDevil lays off large portion of its staff [Updated] (Massively)When it comes to game development, it's somewhat common to see a layoff or realignment of development team members shortly after the release of a title. However, it appears that NetDevil's most recent round of layoffs came as a complete surprise to its employees. After all, the company's most recent release, LEGO Universe, is well past that initial post-launch phase, having gone live back in October 2010, and both Jumpgate Evolution and Fortune Online are (at least supposedly) under development currently at the studio. There are jobs posted on the hiring page, as well.
However, it appears that the developer, owned by Gazillion Entertainment, is on shaky ground as of this morning, according to rumors. The truly horrible thing about this isn't that some developers were laid off -- it's how the affected employees found out. It appears that some of the NetDevil employees were notified that they were going to be laid off via Facebook postings before they were officially contacted by the company, according to a blog posting by Toby Cochran, who worked as a character/creature animator on LEGO Universe. Apparently an image showing a tombstone with the inscription "NetDevil R.I.P. Oct 1997-Feb 2011" started making the rounds on social networking sites shortly thereafter, indicating a far bleaker picture than just that of layoffs.
[Update: We received the following statement from NetDevil: "The transition of members of our team to the LEGO Group allows us to conclude the work-for-hire segment of NetDevil's business and lets us expand our internally-published, free-to-play game businesses based on our own properties and licensed properties. Gazillion is wholly focused on developing, operating, and publishing the next generation of browser-delivered games," said David Brevik, President and COO. "We're proud of the LEGO Universe game that our team built, and we are certain that it has a bright future."]A year later... Jumpgate creators launch Kickstarter campaign for Squad Wars (Neowin) The Kickstarter website is now the host for yet another fund raising campaign for a game that's being developed by a number of industry veterans. This project is called Squad Wars, a web browser-based title that promises to be a "true hardcore PvP space combat" experience with intense space fighter battles, conflicts with huge capital ships and more.
The game is being developed by END Games Entertainment. The founders of the company are Scott Brown and Ryan Seabury, who previously founded Netdevil and made one of the first real MMO games, the space-based Jumpgate. The company released two more MMO games, Auto Assault and Lego Universe, both of which were later shut down. Netdevil also tried to launch a revamped version of Jumpgate, titled Jumpgate Evolution, but that project failed to be released.
END Games Entertainment has already released a number of smartphone games, so the company is already well established, unlike other Kickstarter projects which are trying to launch a development studio as well as a game. END Games is currently looking to raise $280,000 on the Kickstarter web site to fund Squad Wars. With 28 days to go, it has raised less than $7,000 as of this writing.That was 15 months ago- apparently that's all she wrote on Jumpgate. |
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