Rocket Leaving BI and DayZ. "I feel like DayZ is a fundamentally flawed concept"

[Kill8ox]

If Bohemia put some talented people on the game they won't need Dean to finish the project.
With or without him i have full confidence that the game is going to be OK and worth the money.I have not played it for a while,but then again i have not played anything for some time now.

[BrockSamson]

I did have all those things. Many hours of fun, tense battle, excitement...but that was in the mod which led me to purchase Arma and the expansion. I have not had that with SA to date, unless you count falling from a 6 foot high stand to my death as exciting. I guess I did try to shoot a guy at NE airfield from 300 yards away with an M4 unsuccessfully, and that was kinda fun, I guess. Definitely not $30 fun. The best thing to come out of the SA are the YouTube videos of people forcing others to drink disinfectant, battle each other, etc. I just don't see that being worth my $30. The best argument is that I post-paid $30 for the fun I had previously playing DayZ the mod.

He is an artist, but asked me to pay him up front to fund the creation of his art to which he has now declared a broken concept and is taking the money that I gave him to open up his own studio and leaving others to finish his work. He gave a nice warning that this was "Alpha" which was admirable and I understood but forgot to include the clause about giving up, taking my money and investing it into another game(s) that will not be given to me for free (I suspect).

Does this not bother you at all? Why are there apologists for him quitting on a project we all paid for? This is really unforgivable in my eyes and not even defensible. He is announcing his departure before zombies work in his zombie game! Forget all the other features, his zombie game doesn't have zombies.

Rocket sucks. BI doesn't, I don't blame them. They supported him and they will likely try to see this thing through. But, I suspect that DayZ will not be what it could of been without Rocket and I suspect there are serious issues considering Rocket says its broken and there still aren't zombies in the zombie game.

It is so upsetting to me because DayZ was supposed to exemplify the new age of game development. Pitch your idea, crowd source the money, execute, deliver. Somehow Rocket has pitched his idea, taken our money, quit, will use that money to open his own studio, and then I suspect ask for money again. This is unacceptable and I now have no desire to support this sort of development process or attitude.

[SmokenScion]

To quote the Great Lazarus,

"LANDSLIDE"

Told You so. Nee Ner Nee Ner Nee Nee!

Fundamentally FLAWED

[BrockSamson]

This article paints a more optimistic picture and makes it seem like there was a plan and not just Rocket suddenly deciding to bail:

Dean Hall to step down as head of DayZ, leaving Bohemia Interactive | Polygon

Makes me feel a little better but it still doesn't do much for my confidence in Rocket or him taking my money and making plans to leave before the game is even close to acceptable.

[maximusboomus]

I hate to say this - but I think this is the best news I've heard for Day Z yet...

Lets face it - allot of us DONT play the SA because of it's over-intricacy. Dean Hall spent too much time fantisizing over his perfect game rather than making what the players love. Now people will take over who don't have as much anal-retentive detail orientated views and say "People love DayZ mods, lets copy them a ton and add new cool stuff". I think we'll see a final product faster and more geared at what we all want, not what a single guy wants.

[SourceSkills]

I did have all those things. Many hours of fun, tense battle, excitement...but that was in the mod which led me to purchase Arma and the expansion. I have not had that with SA to date, unless you count falling from a 6 foot high stand to my death as exciting. I guess I did try to shoot a guy at NE airfield from 300 yards away with an M4 unsuccessfully, and that was kinda fun, I guess. Definitely not $30 fun. The best thing to come out of the SA are the YouTube videos of people forcing others to drink disinfectant, battle each other, etc. I just don't see that being worth my $30. The best argument is that I post-paid $30 for the fun I had previously playing DayZ the mod.

He is an artist, but asked me to pay him up front to fund the creation of his art to which he has now declared a broken concept and is taking the money that I gave him to open up his own studio and leaving others to finish his work. He gave a nice warning that this was "Alpha" which was admirable and I understood but forgot to include the clause about giving up, taking my money and investing it into another game(s) that will not be given to me for free (I suspect).

Does this not bother you at all? Why are there apologists for him quitting on a project we all paid for? This is really unforgivable in my eyes and not even defensible. He is announcing his departure before zombies work in his zombie game! Forget all the other features, his zombie game doesn't have zombies.

Rocket sucks. BI doesn't, I don't blame them. They supported him and they will likely try to see this thing through. But, I suspect that DayZ will not be what it could of been without Rocket and I suspect there are serious issues considering Rocket says its broken and there still aren't zombies in the zombie game.

It is so upsetting to me because DayZ was supposed to exemplify the new age of game development. Pitch your idea, crowd source the money, execute, deliver. Somehow Rocket has pitched his idea, taken our money, quit, will use that money to open his own studio, and then I suspect ask for money again. This is unacceptable and I now have no desire to support this sort of development process or attitude.

I understand your standpoint and sympathize with your position. However I don't think he to quote "left with the money". He like everyone else in the industry only gets base pay plus bonus if a certain sales mark is reached. He doesn't have the money you speak of so he cant take it and run. Can he take legal action to get more money from BI? Sure because DayZ is his idea but Rocket isn't a scumbag so he won't. BI keeps those profits so that they can keep their projects in development. So to say he is taking the money and running away with it is absurd.

I am disappointed that Rocket couldn't find it in him to try to keep DayZ and his idea of DayZ in sync but sometimes we all get to the point (being an artist myself) when we say it just isn't going to work. I have no doubt that BI will make DayZ into a fantastic game that we will enjoy just as much as the mod and that could be as soon as by the end of the year. We have already seen so much being put into the game in terms of stability and content.

[Mr_Blonde_OPS]

Good luck making another video game at your new home. He fucked the whole entire DayZ community.

[dex71]

I understand your standpoint and sympathize with your position. However I don't think he to quote "left with the money". He like everyone else in the industry only gets base pay plus bonus if a certain sales mark is reached. He doesn't have the money you speak of so he cant take it and run. Can he take legal action to get more money from BI? Sure because DayZ is his idea but Rocket isn't a scumbag so he won't. BI keeps those profits so that they can keep their projects in development. So to say he is taking the money and running away with it is absurd.

Not how business works. The idea isn't his anymore, and likely hasn't been since he joined BI. BI is a business. They aren't going to invest millions into a game, and not take ownership of it from the start. That way, the "idea guy" can't take his idea and shop it out to a higher bidder. He can certainly leave, but his ball belongs to BI now. He can't go after them for more money. There is nothing at BI that belongs to him.

Also, he won't get paid for making sales marks. He got paid for creating a game. Wether his deal was for a finished product, hourly, quarterly, or piecework (where you get paid for every widget you actually create), or possibly just a lump sum. He was likely paid for his idea, as well as what ever work he put into it.

And maybe he was fired. Just because the press announcements say it was he who was leaving, that could just be BI allowing him to save some face. Maybe they were unhappy with the lack of progress.....or the fact that a zombie game had no working zombies.....maybe he was just an asshole....who knows. Reading between the lines, it sounds like BI was unhappy with him (IMO), or the fact that it was going to be years until even a BETA release much less a retail version.

If he did just leave without finishing the game, it sounds like he may fit in perfectly over at the DICE Studios.

[Kanati]

Rocket strikes me as a much less intelligent Derek Smart. If anyone remembers the Battlecruiser 3000AD fiasco where he took FOREVER to create it. He announced that it was going to have about eight million features and even the most optimistic people thought he was being too ambitious. Unlike Rocket, he didn't bail though. But the distributor forced a release that was flat out broken. The game wouldn't even let you play it 90% of the time. He finally bought the rights back to it if I remember right and a number of patches later he finally had the game he had envisioned.

Rocket seems like he's more of an idea man and can't do what Smart did. So in a reversal of BC3000AD, Rocket releases an alpha (which was by all accounts WAY late to still be in alpha) so that he can fund the project further... And unable to go further with the idea, says fuck it, it's broken, here Bohemia, you figure it out. And hopefully Bohemia will pick up the torch and put their people on it and finish the game.

[BrockSamson]

I should have clarified why I am so frustrated and appalled. I thought most knew what he was getting... from his AMA on redit. The guy made out like a bandit and yes, he raped us of our money and will continue to for quite some time if BI is successful. One can only hope that BI can null the contract for royalties or that Rocket already missed some contractually obligated deadline.

"But I get a royalty, and I get paid. I also sold (assigned) the rights for DayZ to Bohemia so I was remunerated there too. Compared to royalty rates for other "artists" and such I am probably doing very well. Compared to game designers (who mostly don't get royalties) I'm doing extremely well."