From Kael:
I’m sure the news is starting to creep out, so I’ll let you all know that I’m still here. Many, many of my favorite super talented people are not. It is a shitty day.
Going to put this out there. Layoffs are like roaches, you rarely see just one. That’s why 30 Cryptic employees updated their resumes and set themselves as open for work on LinkedIn. Kael still has a job, but he knows he is not secure.
Legendary bundles typically go on sale about 2 weeks after the previous intro sale finished, so this is completely expected and not signaling anything.
But if we see Mudd bundles for 75% off including ships, yeah, THEN it’s obviously all about the immediate cash and screw the consequences. Or if the MW D7 and/or Atlas/Thrai/D9 appear in a bundle.
If there’s a positive side to the last few years of mandatory event grind it’s this – I generated insane amounts of dil to exchange for zen. Between that, the stipend, and glacial drip feed of content I don’t feel like I need to spend money, and haven’t since they pissed me off with the 11th anniv. bundle. Bought the 12th and 13th with in-game earned zen, and still have most of the zen I bought in anticipation of the 11th bundle. I hate gambling so that makes things even easier on me.
They had mentioned environmental and other art is the gating factor for content. This is very much moving the wrong direction.
An Atlas/Thrai/D9 bundle is the only one I can think of that really interests me. Sad to think that it could be seen as a bad sign for the game.
Being moved to being run by DECA is an even worse sign. The future of the game looks dark indeed. From what I can see, DECA is hospice care for mostly dead mobile and browser games. Ah well, I got several years of entertainment from STO, works out to about to dinner and a movie a month.
This fucking sucks. Some of the people they fired have been there for over a decade: not just administrative staff, but people who developed content for the game, like ship artists. No wonder why they put the legendary bundles on sale just now, they’re trying to appease their shareholders. Well, they can get fucked, I’m keeping my two hundred bucks.
From other sources, it seems like the people laid off had moved to other projects that were cancelled, and were not working on STO full time. Which still sucks and represents a loss of institutional knowledge, but may not impact the game directly.
Give it time. Firing everyone on not yet generating revenue projects is low hanging fruit. Kael is in shock and mourning, I’m not expecting the best from reading between the lines.
