Kabaal Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 More Info here too. JJ That's not more info, it's just a quote of the sticky with a 1 paragraph blah blah about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeypesci Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 (edited) This should be a wake up call for BioWare concerning TOR....but I get this feeling some of them in management are still sleeping...dreaming what could have been. And sadly it's probably the lower people and not the management who've made poor decisions yet who are on the bigger pay packets. I see it all the time in companies. Shame they haven't had a shack up of the customer service department. But then that's what you get when you out source your call centre. Always a bad move as it shows you don't really care about customer service. Edited May 22, 2012 by joeypesci Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Temad Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 Another reason I know they were not contractors is that in the PR release on the SWTOR site, they mentioned the people being let go would be taken care of. You give severance to employees, you don't do anything with contractors except ask for their badge and send them on their way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord_Ravenhurst Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 (edited) I am pretty sure this can viewed as a bad sign far more than a good one. Less people working on a massively bugged and unfinished game right after having to announce massive subscriber loss...well, I would say this can only be a bad sign. But you keep farting rainbows and daisies the world is a better place with optimists, even delusional ones. Uhmm... from my posting history you should know I´m not farting rainbows, usually I am an unsubbed, pessimistic, nagging feature requester who thinks this game took a completely wrong direction already at concept phase. But I always appreciated things which I found positive and said so. Besides that, who said they will not replace the lay-offs? Did I miss something? To me it seems people get replaced, only reducing the team wouldn´t be that good, I agree. Edited May 22, 2012 by Lord_Ravenhurst Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SweetOldBob Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 they announce layoffs and you dream about them adding new staff? let me be blunt: lol. this ^^^ I develop software products (not games) for a living. I have worked at companies that had layoffs; this has always signaled the start of a death spiral and that it's time to get your resume in shape and leave, not that a fresh burst of creativity is on the horizon. I love the game and I hope I'm wrong, but this sure looks bad to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kanshan Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 If you remember back BioWare had moved over Devs from Dragons Age 3. It could be they removed them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Temad Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 "Besides that, who said they will not replace the lay-offs? Did I miss something? To me it seems people get replaced, only reducing the team wouldn´t be that good, I agree. " The mentioned letting people go in their PR release. If they were letting some go only to have them replaced it would have been an entirely different PR release. They shrunk the staff, that is why they had a PR release. It is a big deal financially as they will have to report and file this with the SEC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cerion Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 OMG Earth and Beyond I was there, it was glorious. I dislike EA... I don't feel like any company they take over grows, it's just incorporated into their blob I still have the discs Can't bear to throw out such a masterful work of art Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Celebrus Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 The game doesn't have a viable future that is worth dedicating the neccessary resources to it, as made obvious with the lost 400,000 subscriptions. This is why there are layoffs. I wonder what if feels like to think you have a truly amazing and groundbreaking game that you've been working on for the past 8 years of your life only to see it fail within the first 6 months. In my opinion, the top staff should have been fired before now for delivering such a poor job with the amount of resources they were given. Couldn't have said it better myself. The game has fallen flat on it's face, and EA simply isn't going to continue pumping resources into something that isn't going to succeed in the way it was expected to, they simply wont waste their time and money. As if content wasn't coming to us slowly enough, I seriously doubt we'll being seeing very many patches this year after 1.3, I'd say this was the beginning of the end, but that was back in December. It's been a downhill slide since EGA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asavar Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 Will we ever see Ranked Warzones? http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/05/22/star-wars-the-old-republic-hit-with-layoffs/ Who cares about pvpers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord_Ravenhurst Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 So I guess there might be some new jobs open soon.... http://www.bioware.com/careers/austin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheOnlyKyrenS Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 For **** sakes people. Just because it says BioWare, doesn't mean that it was directly due to SWTOR. Tough economy. I like how people say that biodrones need to take off the rose tinted glasses. Those people need to open their eyes all together. If you don't like a game, unsub and kindly **** off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jgelling Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 If you remember back BioWare had moved over Devs from Dragons Age 3. It could be they removed them. I believe that was a temporary transfer - these sound like layoffs from the core team: for one they mention they are SWTOR people, for another they're getting severance which suggests they weren't just contractors, and finally they didn't mention numbers or names, which suggests a substantial cut. I wouldn't be surprised if this is a 15-20% layoff. I hope they quickly release a dev roadmap to show they have firm plans to soften the blow from this, or else all the gaming sites will have a field day describing TOR as "beleaguered" in every story. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rivensong Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 I'm very sorry to hear about the layoffs and I hope that those affected bounce back and are doing well. I have to say the drop in subscriptions, the now lighter server populations, and now this don't have me feeling the most confident about the possible future of TOR. That being said I'm not going anywhere anytime soon. Could we please get some good news about the game and development? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord_Ravenhurst Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 (edited) To me, it shows that the Docs are trying to correct mistakes that have been made with TOR and are actually doing something about it. ^^ this! No doubt about it. From now on it can only get better Edited May 22, 2012 by Lord_Ravenhurst Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-Kelerak- Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 omg guys... blizzard had layoffs too... and lol, they are just fine lol... get a life boys... come on... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Celebrus Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 (edited) I' That being said I'm not going anywhere anytime soon. Could we please get some good news about the game and development? They're hard at work trying to fabricate some good news by reannouncing everything they've already told us about 1.3 in an "official" video. Seriously man, there is no good news to be given, if you want good news, find a different game to talk about. omg guys... blizzard had layoffs too... and lol, they are just fine lol... get a life boys... come on... Bioware != Blizzard. Edited May 22, 2012 by Celebrus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LovarBoy Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 Community Manager's are layed off, too. A German CM is fired, don't know about more of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cerion Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 EA simply isn't going to continue pumping resources into something that isn't going to succeed in the way it was expected to, they simply wont waste their time and money. Your mistake is believing EA suits know anything about running an MMO. If EA had had control of WoW during its first year instead of Blizzard/Activision, it would have killed off the project, lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DizzD Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 (edited) This is probably the real reason. During launch they need a massive Customer Support team and bug killing team too tackle urgent bugs. Its very, very sad. Mainly for those people who lost their jobs. But this is the reality of MMO's and companies. I know people love to think of gaming companies separate from others but at the end of the day if they don't need certain people they will get rid of them. Yeah because obviously bugs aren't an issue anymore and who needs CS staff going into a massive server transfer campaign? /sarcasm OFF EA is wielding the Axe of Firing because SWTOR is performing below expectations, pure and simple. Note to self: avoid this drone's podcast. Edited May 22, 2012 by DizzD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erictlewis Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 So I guess there might be some new jobs open soon.... http://www.bioware.com/careers/austin All of those except one position are Q&A , the one is a marketing person the other was game analysts, and that means they are bringing in somebody to do the math on weather to sunset the game, and or put more resources in it. You don't ever hire a game analyst unless you got major problems and your own bean counters cant figure out what the deal is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jgelling Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 Community Manager's are layed off, too. A German CM is fired, don't know about more of them. So the rumor mill seems to be saying across the board cuts? That sounds like they took a machete to it for cost-cutting purposes. It looks like EA's CEO did tip his hand on TOR's place in the stable when he said it was not in the top 5? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arkerus Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 Maybe this means the haters will FINALLY get off the forums and let us talk about the game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Celebrus Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 Your mistake is believing EA suits know anything about running an MMO. If EA had had control of WoW during its first year instead of Blizzard/Activision, it would have killed off the project, lol. Actually I don't believe that, not at all, in fact. Thats why I'm so certain this game is headed down the toilet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jett-Rinn Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 omg guys... blizzard had layoffs too... and lol, they are just fine lol... get a life boys... come on... The hate machine has to rub their hands in glee....one day Bioware will get a clue and not allow former subscribers to still post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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