Trials of Ascension, Shady Practices and the Big Crowdfunding Debate

[lawow74]

ah, we had momentary derailments in the past, this GM stuff will die down soon... and Brax will unveil his grand plan..

Yeah, I'll start mixing the Kool-Aid...

[derium]

I see your point about the KS rewards, and if that is what you are concerned about, then you are doing a good thing. But honestly, are there people out there that are really outraged about not getting a t-shirt they were promised? Everything else is very similar to ToA, where they were selling ingame items for a game that wasn´t even in alpha yet. One thing we did in this thread was highlighted some hidden legal text on the ToA website where they said that things you bought in their cash-shop were donations, and they had no obligation to deliver the items.

um, what? When did this suddenly become about shirts? Where did you get the idea I'm demanding shirts?? I was demanding he be held legally responsible for the 100k he brought in.

Let me dismantle you for a second. You say Jason has money, but the KS money is gone, therefore the only thing left he can give is shirts? You have no idea how legal proceedings work, do you? Do you really think that when you are sued, the courts say "well, you owe $100,000 and you have it. But since it's not the exact same money, just give what you think is okay"...

I've waited for YEARS to go for the throat. And I finally had my chance to, I made my demands clear. Produce what you say, own up to it and give us the paper trail, or return the money.

Not sure why you are trying to bait me, maybe you don't really understand and you're aiming super low. Either way, I've stated whoever is responsible needs to follow through. If you think that once shirts are sent out, I'll consider a 100k debt even, you're insane.

[Taojnhy]

um, what? When did this suddenly become about shirts? Where did you get the idea I'm demanding shirts?? I was demanding he be held legally responsible for the 100k he brought in.

Let me dismantle you for a second. You say Jason has money, but the KS money is gone, therefore the only thing left he can give is shirts? You have no idea how legal proceedings work, do you? Do you really think that when you are sued, the courts say "well, you owe $100,000 and you have it. But since it's not the exact same money, just give what you think is okay"...

I've waited for YEARS to go for the throat. And I finally had my chance to, I made my demands clear. Produce what you say, own up to it and give us the paper trail, or return the money.

Not sure why you are trying to bait me, maybe you don't really understand and you're aiming super low. Either way, I've stated whoever is responsible needs to follow through. If you think that once shirts are sent out, I'll consider a 100k debt even, you're insane.

Yeah, not entirely sure where the focusing on shirts is coming from, since I don't think I've even heard you say the word "shirt" once in your three videos Derium, nor on your posts on the RPG Codex.

That said, I don't think Azrile is trying to bait you; I suspect there are some misunderstandings though as to what you've been working to accomplish and why. I think you've pretty well clarified that here.

Also, did I understand your first video correctly Derium where you showed a picture (Derium's Sword) that appeared to be a reward for donating $35000 to mean that you donated that much to GM?

[Azrile]

um, what? When did this suddenly become about shirts? Where did you get the idea I'm demanding shirts?? I was demanding he be held legally responsible for the 100k he brought in.

Let me dismantle you for a second. You say Jason has money, but the KS money is gone, therefore the only thing left he can give is shirts? You have no idea how legal proceedings work, do you? Do you really think that when you are sued, the courts say "well, you owe $100,000 and you have it. But since it's not the exact same money, just give what you think is okay"...

I've waited for YEARS to go for the throat. And I finally had my chance to, I made my demands clear. Produce what you say, own up to it and give us the paper trail, or return the money.

Not sure why you are trying to bait me, maybe you don't really understand and you're aiming super low. Either way, I've stated whoever is responsible needs to follow through. If you think that once shirts are sent out, I'll consider a 100k debt even, you're insane.

I am not trying to bait you. But I think you misunderstand Kickstarter. He is under no legal obligation to produce a game just because he raised the money from the kickstarter. He also has no legal responsibility to show where every penny of the money went. The ONLY legal responsibility he has is to show that he fulfilled the donor rewards he promised ( which I translate to t-shirts just to be short) and to show that he made an effort to make the game. There is, as far as I know, only one court case involving a failed kickstarter, and that is ONLY because the guy basically admitted he never even attempted to make the game. Based on the past court case, just those chat logs from James will allow Jason to walk away clean. For over two years, he was spending the KS left and right on anything that James wanted. There is NO WAY anyone can honestly say his intent the whole time was to pocket the money.

I think your mistake in this is thinking that as soon as someone has a successful kickstarter, they are legally required to open the books to their business for anyone to see. Sorry, the only thing he is legally required to do is the t-shirts and show an honest effort to make the product he listed.

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I've waited for YEARS to go for the throat. And I finally had my chance to, I made my demands clear. Produce what you say, own up to it and give us the paper trail, or return the money.

Yeah dude.. ´go for the throat´. This is obviously not about the KS, this is about him personally.

And again.. stop talking about legal stuff. Legally, you are going to lose, especially now that James is responsible for the t-shirts. Jason is, and never was under any legal obligation to show you crap regarding where the money went, that is not a requirement for KS, is not in their legal requirements, and in fact, the exact opposite is written all over KS itself.

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I'll consider a 100k debt even, you're insane.

IT IS NOT A DEBT. Please read more about Kickstarter before you rant in another video. People recently gave a guy $50,000 to make potato salad. Do you think he needs to pay them back?

The only thing Jason needs to show is that he made an effort to make the game. Kickstarter does NOT demand that the purpose of the KS happens, they only demand that rewards that are promised are deliverd ( ie t-shirts).

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That said, I don't think Azrile is trying to bait you; I suspect there are some misunderstandings though as to what you've been working to accomplish and why. I think you've pretty well clarified that here.

Exactly, the misunderstanding is his use of the word ´legally´ When he started talking about things that Jason was legally required to fulfill, I assumed he was talking about the t-shirts, since that is the ONLY thing that Jason is legally required to do.

If he thinks Jason is legally required to show where the money went, then he is wrong, and used the word ´legally´ when he shouldn´t have.

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Also, did I understand your first video correctly Derium where you showed a picture (Derium's Sword) that appeared to be a reward for donating $35000 to mean that you donated that much to GM?

I have no idea how much he donated, but i have a feeling this is his reason for ´going for the throat´. He basically donated a lot of money to a CEO who never made a game before, didn´t know anything except HTML, and to a lead dev who is mentally ill and lives at home with his mother.

He is like the polar opposite of Fornax.

Honestly, what is so fucking hard about saying ´hey, show me the last game you made´.. before throwing thousands of dollars at someone.

And now these freakin SAME idiots are falling in line behind James. How long do you think it takes before James has a ´donate now´ button on his website and these same idiots can´t wait to press it. Oh wait, James doesn´t have paypal, because he doens´t have a back account or valid ID.

Maybe you should stop going for the throat of other people, and instead do some self-analysis on what in the fucking world you were thinking before paying thousands of dollars for an ingame sword from someone who NEVER MADE A GAME BEFORE.

Guys, I am sorry I am defending Jason. He is a total douchebag, but at some point you just have to admit it was your fault for your lack of due diligence.

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and if you think I was bullshitting about how little James has done in 3 years. This is the video he released. This is his progress after working on the game for 3 years, having many other people working with him, and by his own chat logs basically having someone write checks for whatever he wanted.. He freakin hired someone to do icons for spells, and that person just ripped them out of WOW and sold them to James...and he STILL used them in his demo video.

[dextersmith]

Mr. Joel Hager's debut post on RPG Codex.

And now we wait.

He showed up on mmorpg, said he's new to gm and that he's sorry. I asked him what he's apologizing for and he said he heard Jason was unpopular and he's here to fix things. I asked how he could apologize when he doesn't even know why he's sorry (without cussing) and found I was reported for verbally attacking him and had my post deleted. James then pm-ed me to try to win me over for gm and his new company with Joel. I paraphrased fuck off, I don't give a shit then deleted it. Both are d-bags imo. Iirc, he may have hinted at how things might improve with him and Joel leading the project in a new direction. I may have misinterpreted but wonder if this recent gm incident was conspired.

Edit: Joel started here as jrhager84
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/6554271

[Taojnhy]

Guys, I am sorry I am defending Jason. He is a total douchebag, but at some point you just have to admit it was your fault for your lack of due diligence.

I don't know; I see this as a case where Appleton and Proctor were both to blame. Obviously Proctor couldn't be legally held accountable while working for Appleton, but the sheer amount of ignorance, misleading and mismanagement from both people are pretty amazing. I don't equate coming down a bit more heavily on one as defending the other. I feel they're both, to use your word, douchebags, but of different...um...models (not sure what's the appropriate noun to use here when differentiating douchebaggery). Appleton comes across as an egocentric, self-aggrandizing salesman who has no qualms about misrepresenting himself. Proctor, on the other hand, seems to be an irresponsible, temperamental and unethical man-child who has no qualms about misusing resources for his own amusement and gain (note how he's pushing his individual projects that were undoubtedly created with the stuff Appleton purchased).

But, it appears that Appleton is out of the picture for the moment, if not for good. Focus needs to be brought to bear on Proctor and now Hagel; moreso now considering that Proctor will be the one working on his own code. There shouldn't be any kind of delays brought on by new coders acclimating themselves to old code here.

He showed up on mmorpg, said he's new to gm and that he's sorry. I asked him what he's apologizing for and he said he heard Jason was unpopular and he's here to fix things. I asked how he could apologize when he doesn't even know why he's sorry (without cussing) and found I was reported for verbally attacking him and had my post deleted. James then pm-ed me to try to win me over for gm and his new company with Joel. I paraphrased fuck off, I don't give a shit then deleted it. Both are d-bags imo. Iirc, he may have hinted at how things might improve with him and Joel leading the project in a new direction. I may have misinterpreted but wonder if this recent gm incident was conspired.

Well, that's pretty messed up, but not at all surprising. Proctor, and by extension, Hagel are currently enjoying a brief moment of pro-Proctor sentiment from the most vocal poster on that RPG Codex thread, and even he has made it clear that he's aware of his own bias. It won't last long and if MMO Interactive doesn't use this window wisely, well, the video game community has shown on multiple occasions just how willing it is to savage those who betray trusts.

[Kyanion]

Ascension of Greed!? Trials of Monger? Anyways I don't think people understand how Kickstarter works, good fucking luck getting any of that money back. People really back some stupid shit and donate to the most random crap. I mean I watch streamers on Twitch and stupid people throw wads of money at them for a couple seconds of acknowledgement. Some people are worthy of those donations, most of them aren't. Kickstarter is the same way, most of the stuff on there is not worth backing.

[dextersmith]

And now these freakin SAME idiots are falling in line behind James. How long do you think it takes before James has a ´donate now´ button on his website and these same idiots can´t wait to press it. Oh wait, James doesn´t have paypal, because he doens´t have a back account or valid ID.

It's hard to believe Jason fell for that. ID is required for anything government related ie social benefits. Any official income or tax matter requires a social security number (in the US?), which requires ID. He can't be off the grid.

and if you think I was bullshitting about how little James has done in 3 years. This is the video he released. This is his progress after working on the game for 3 years, having many other people working with him, and by his own chat logs basically having someone write checks for whatever he wanted.. He freakin hired someone to do icons for spells, and that person just ripped them out of WOW and sold them to James...and he STILL used them in his demo video.

I thought they were his placeholders! Inc Blizzard! It's a great time to bail gm! Lol they paid for those?!

[Azrile]

Well, that's pretty messed up, but not at all surprising. Proctor, and by extension, Hagel are currently enjoying a brief moment of pro-Proctor sentiment from the most vocal poster on that RPG Codex thread, and even he has made it clear that he's aware of his own bias. It won't last long and if MMO Interactive doesn't use this window wisely, well, the video game community has shown on multiple occasions just how willing it is to savage those who betray trusts.

I don´t understand the sympathy at all. In 2012, Protor was telling people that alpha was a few weeks away.. it launched last week. He is the one that convinced Jason that they should change engines and constantly switched crap. Teddy in comparison, always seemed fairly honest.. but for 3 years, James has been on the ones on the forums talking about the newest update that is always just a few weeks away.

He had an open wallet for 3 years and was able to produce the video I linked above. Why does anyone even think anything will be able to accomplish anything going forward?

[dextersmith]

Well, that's pretty messed up, but not at all surprising. Proctor, and by extension, Hagel are currently enjoying a brief moment of pro-Proctor sentiment from the most vocal poster on that RPG Codex thread, and even he has made it clear that he's aware of his own bias. It won't last long and if MMO Interactive doesn't use this window wisely, well, the video game community has shown on multiple occasions just how willing it is to savage those who betray trusts.

Edit: Joel started here as jrhager84
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/6554271

He's too slick here imo, already blaming Jason's greed in #3 while acting the backer's hero with James; hired PR doesn't throw you under the bus, and newcomers with no personal interest in gm don't play hero. Suspicious?
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/6556917

[Kyanion]

reminds me of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_N5gixJ2X8M

You want the real fucked up part of that Myobi? Zilean also known as Kilani used to raid with us in WoW before D3 was a thing. Even then he used to tell us in vent that he was disabled. But thanks to twitch he turned that into a money making scheme to play off of his 'handicap' and get donations from suckers. When I saw that video of him walking I was pissed. Not just because he was scamming people but that he just flat out lied to us in the guild just because he could.

But it really highlights just how stupid people are with money in this age of internet streamers and Kickstarters. It would be like the same people opening up their wallet and then throwing money at a TV show that was providing entertainment (and yes I get that you do pay for tv shows by watching commercials and shit), but its like paying even MORE to do that. I watch people toss hundreds of dollars at streamers or spend a thousand bucks to back something on KS. People can do what they want with their money but it is really weird how this type of thing is getting more popular.

[Taojnhy]

I don´t understand the sympathy at all. In 2012, Protor was telling people that alpha was a few weeks away.. it launched last week. He is the one that convinced Jason that they should change engines and constantly switched crap. Teddy in comparison, always seemed fairly honest.. but for 3 years, James has been on the ones on the forums talking about the newest update that is always just a few weeks away.

He had an open wallet for 3 years and was able to produce the video I linked above. Why does anyone even think anything will be able to accomplish anything going forward?

Oh, I assure you, the sympathy Proctor is currently enjoying has very little to do with GM and that terrible video of a male blow-up doll walking around a game world and more to do with two things: 1) the fact that people hated every fiber of Appleton's being because of his past behavior (and made it too easy to set Proctor up as a sympathetic victim) and 2) the circle-jerk satisfaction that came from those trying to convince Proctor to leave when he finally did leave. Few things validate people more than feeling that they made a difference in playing a bit role to get Proctor to dramatically exit (temporarily) GM. Plus, Proctor's claim to being disabled is certainly good for some sympathy points.

It won't last long and once people realize that Appleton really isn't in the picture anymore, Proctor is going to find himself under quite a lot more scrutiny. The fact that he so willingly engaged in that drama just makes it easier for people to call him out if he doesn't shape up and make a game people want to play.

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Edit: Joel started here as jrhager84
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/6554271

He's too slick here imo, already blaming Jason's greed in #3 while acting the backer's hero with James; hired PR doesn't throw you under the bus, and newcomers with no personal interest in gm don't play hero. Suspicious?
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/6556917

If by suspicious, you're asking if I think Hagel and Proctor conspired to finally wrest control of GM from Appleton? Entirely plausible. Equally plausible that Hagel recognized a golden opportunity when he saw the imminent collapse of GM that was prompted by Proctor's actions.

If Proctor had any kind of track record of actually completing projects and making them competitive, I could even see Proctor releasing that shitty GM gameplay video to help precipitate ECG's crisis; keep in mind that Proctor stated that he was working on -three- simultaneous iterations of GM and no one could understand why. I don't believe that was the case here; long-term planning doesn't seem to be one of Proctor's stronger traits.

Edit: found two more of Proctor's unfinished projects, both last updated during his GM development period that I've added to the post a few pages back.

[Azrile]

did you see his explanation of why he is developing 3 versions? They are three different networking systems... because none of them can actually make a MMORPG yet. He is developing all 3 because he doesn´t yet know which one will actually progress in the future enough to be viable.

[Taojnhy]

did you see his explanation of why he is developing 3 versions? They are three different networking systems... because none of them can actually make a MMORPG yet. He is developing all 3 because he doesn´t yet know which one will actually progress in the future enough to be viable.

Yeah, I saw it, but honestly I just assumed that the reason he gave was BS on general principle. It doesn't make much sense to me, but then I don't claim to know anything about making games, let alone netcode viability.

[dextersmith]

If by suspicious, you're asking if I think Hagel and Proctor conspired to finally wrest control of GM from Appleton? Entirely plausible. Equally plausible that Hagel recognized a golden opportunity when he saw the imminent collapse of GM that was prompted by Proctor's actions.

If Proctor had any kind of track record of actually completing projects and making them competitive, I could even see Proctor releasing that shitty GM gameplay video to help precipitate ECO's crisis; keep in mind that Proctor stated that he was working on -three- simultaneous iterations of GM and no one could understand why. I don't believe that was the case here; long-term planning doesn't seem to be one of Proctor's stronger traits.

They dropped HE so all 3 simultaneous iterations was on Unity? So I take it Jason didn't care about redundancy or didn't know what went on under his nose.

[Azrile]

I could even see Proctor releasing that shitty GM gameplay video to help precipitate ECG's crisis

he just mentioned the video in that thread and linked to it. I think your theory that he sabatoged the video just to create the crisis is unfounded. He is actually showing it off again.

Oh, and he has 6-7 new developers who joined the team today.....

And he has the mandatory blame someone else for what failed last week, but promises of something great coming next week that makes this all worthwhile. He says the same stuff in ever post.. an excuse for the past, a promise for tomorrow.

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Yeah, I saw it, but honestly I just assumed that the reason he gave was BS on general principle. It doesn't make much sense to me, but then I don't claim to know anything about making games, let alone netcode viability.

I mentioned it previously about Atavism. Anyone who is developing a MMORPG using Atavism at the moment is doing a lot of work in the hopes that a year from now, the devs of Atavism actually make it viable. You can´t currently make a MMORPG using it. He is using two other systems in case the devs of Atavism can´t do it. One of the other systems is his own system.. which also doesn´t work.

[Taojnhy]

he just mentioned the video in that thread and linked to it. I think your theory that he sabatoged the video just to create the crisis is unfounded. He is actually showing it off again.

Oh, and he has 6-7 new developers who joined the team today.....

And he has the mandatory blame someone else for what failed last week, but promises of something great coming next week that makes this all worthwhile. He says the same stuff in ever post.. an excuse for the past, a promise for tomorrow.

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I mentioned it previously about Atavism. Anyone who is developing a MMORPG using Atavism at the moment is doing a lot of work in the hopes that a year from now, the devs of Atavism actually make it viable. You can´t currently make a MMORPG using it. He is using two other systems in case the devs of Atavism can´t do it. One of the other systems is his own system.. which also doesn´t work.

Thanks for clarifying the reasoning there, that does make a kind of sense, but seems like putting the cart before three different horses. Also, I agree that my theory is completely unfounded; I said if Proctor actually had a history of producing complete and quality products then released that mess then I would suspect sabotage.

But, if there's one thing we can all agree about Proctor, it's that he has yet to finish a single project he's started.

[Throren]

Some guy on the ToA forums thinks that Gassy's ToA dragon model will be better than the Ragnosaur dragon demo for the unreal 4 engine....

They think this






will be better than this





Don't get me wrong, it is a very well modeled dragon and does look pretty cool and it does look liek a lot of hard work was put in on it...but man, these folks are delusional and need to stop with the kool-aid. It's just pure blind fan-boyism

[dextersmith]

WoW needs to be this!

[lawow74]

Don't get me wrong, it is a very well modeled dragon and does look pretty cool and it does look liek a lot of hard work was put in on it...but man, these folks are delusional and need to stop with the kool-aid. It's just pure blind fan-boyism

On a more selfish note, it's also how you keep a schlub who's working for free on something you want a-schlubbin along. IMO 'Hey wow that's awesome keep it up!' translates to 'God, can't you work any faster, you tool?? I wanna play this game SOMETIME before I die!! Oh well, guess you get what you pay for...'