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Telltale Games is shutting down

LESS T_T

Arcane
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Codex 2014
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/...ead_developer_Telltale_Games_closing_down.php

Report: The Walking Deaddeveloper Telltale Games closing down

Telltale Games, the studio behind games like The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us appears to be closing its doors, according to social media posts from multiple developers previously employed that the company.

Gamasutra has reached out to Telltale Games for more details on the situation, but posts from developers on Twitter and Facebook, both private and public, seem to indicate that the studio is shutting is shutting down or experiencing large-scale layoffs. This story will be updated following the studio's reply.

If you or someone you know has been affected by this closure, you can email Gamasutra to share your story confidentially.

Will remember that?
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
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Codex 2014
Well I cannot find the actual posts on social media.

The Verge reports they are not closing but it's a big layoff, downsizing to a team of 25 people: https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/21/17888162/telltale-games-layoffs-the-walking-dead

Telltale Games, creators of episodic adventure games like The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, and Batman: The Enemy Within, laid off a large number of its staff today. The company will retain a small team of around 25.

The final season of Telltale’s award-winning series, The Walking Dead, kicked off last month.

Developing...

Another wording: mass layoffs with "the possibility of the studio closing entirely": https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-09-21-developers-report-mass-layoffs-at-telltale-games

Developers report mass layoffs at Telltale Games
Various social media posts indicate major exodus, possible studio closure

A number of developers on Twitter have reported mass layoffs occurring at Telltale Games today, including the possibility of the studio closing entirely.

Over the last hour, a flurry of social media posts from developers at places such as Rockstar, Zenimax, Treyarch, and ArenaNet have expressed sympathy for those losing their jobs at the studio. One confirmed tweet from a former Telltale narrative designer relates that she no longer has a job, while another tweet from a former Telltale employee corroborates the layoffs as well.

GamesIndustry.biz has reached out to Telltale Games for comment and will update this story as more information is available.

https://www.usgamer.net/articles/re...-wolf-among-us-2-and-stranger-things-canceled

An anonymous source familiar with the situation has told USgamer that Telltale filed for bankruptcy.

An anonymous source familiar with the company told USgamer that a skeleton crew will work to finish The Walking Dead Final Season while The Wolf Among Us Season 2 and Stranger Things are effectively cancelled.
 
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BEvers

I'm forever blowing
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Verge updated:

Telltale Games, creators of episodic adventure games like The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, and Batman: The Enemy Within, laid off a large number of its staff today. The company will retain a small team of around 25. According to multiple sources The Verge spoke with, employees were let go with no severance.

The final season of Telltale’s award-winning series, The Walking Dead, kicked off last month. The second episode is slated to launch next week.

The layoffs come a few months after revelations that Telltale was a studio mired in toxic management that included employees subjected to constant overwork. Once an industry darling, working on iconic brands like Game of Thrones and Minecraft, Telltale quickly spiraled. In June, co-founder and former CEO Kevin Bruner sued the company seeking recovery of financial damages. Telltale described the suit as “meritless” and “an apparent means of extracting revenge on a company already under financial strain.”

This isn’t the first time Telltale has been subject to layoffs; last November the company laid off 90 employees, approximately 25 percent of its workforce. “The realities of the environment we face moving forward demand we evolve, as well, reorienting our organization with a focus on delivering fewer, better games with a smaller team,” CEO Pete Hawley said at the time.
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
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So they are actually closing down, have filed a bankruptcy, and only keeping the small team to finish the final season of The Walking Dead.
 

BEvers

I'm forever blowing
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So if these figures are correct, they had about 360 employees last November? :eek:
 

Kem0sabe

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And nothing was lost. They promoted one of the most damaging gaming trends of the last decade, the interactive tv episode game with barely any gameplay involved beyond QTE's... fuck those guys and everything they represent.
 

taxalot

I'm a spicy fellow.
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Codex 2013 PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015
Their only good game since Sam And Max devil's playhouse was Tales from the Borderlands. Nothing much of value is lost.

The guys behind The Council and Life is Strange are much better at doing Telltale game themselves. It's not the Telltale formula that's the problem : it's Telltale.
 

Boleskine

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Last edited:

taxalot

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Their only good game since Sam And Max devil's playhouse was Tales from the Borderlands.
I didn't see anything of value in this. Instead, The Wolf Among Us was rather nice, too bad it was only one season.

I loved their Borderlands game. It was not pretentious but nicely executed. A simple story with good characters. It worked.
 

Jenkem

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Make the Codex Great Again! Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. I helped put crap in Monomyth
Their only good game since Sam And Max devil's playhouse was Tales from the Borderlands.
I didn't see anything of value in this. Instead, The Wolf Among Us was rather nice, too bad it was only one season.

I loved their Borderlands game. It was not pretentious but nicely executed. A simple story with good characters. It worked.

It was better than it had any right to be and a lot better than the actual borderlands games
 

Tramboi

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Yes, I didn't forgive :
* killing Bone, the game that their first customers (such as I) bought to support a new studio with an original license
* going from few-puzzles to no-puzzle
* direct control in Monkey Island
* zero investment in their engine (no remappable keys in ten years with a 300 person studio ? Go fuck yourself, greedy bastards)

One more lesson : when you live by a niche (adventure gamers), respect your niche

So, now, Daedalic...
 

MRY

Wormwood Studios
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So, I've got a just-so story here. I don't know if it's true; probably, it would break down with scrutiny. But here it is:

Every x years, game developers discover that by sharply reducing interaction, it is possible to make games that are much more cinematic than is typical. Off the top of my head, examples I remember, in roughly chronological order, are Dragon's Lair and Space Ace; rail shooters; and FMV games (some FMV games preserved a reasonable level of interaction, but many did not). The problem is, these games are most successful at the outset because there is this huge and immediate production quality difference that can mask other shortfalls. I remember the awe I felt every time I saw Dragon's Lair and Space Ace in the arcade, but when I finally managed to play Dragon's Lair, Space Ace barely held my attention.

The Telltale model unveiled in The Walking Dead seems to fit with this. Because it uses QTE gameplay, it was able to do all sorts of stuff that ordinary adventure games (and even RPGs) really can't. Rather than a protagonist whose action set is limited to things like "combine batteries with walkie talkie," you can have "kick zombie in the head while dragging a child to safety." This opens entirely new storytelling possibilities in terms of both characters and plot. And thus, TellTale was able to make quasi-games for superheroes, GOT, etc., etc. -- any possible setting, protagonist, and plot was feasible because you can map any verbs onto the QTE buttons and any personality on dialogue trees.

But this model hits the same problem as the other ones, which is that there's an immediate awe with game 1, but the awe is mostly gone by game 1 + n. Eventually, people would rather not play games on rails and have their interactions limited to picking which FMV plays next. Once the awe wears off, you're left with something that is simply less fun to play. But because the goal is always a "cinematic experience," you need the audiovisuals to be quite good, which is expensive. And to keep the awe alive, you need to keep one-upping those audiovisuals. The result is more buck for less bang, until eventually the cinematic genre disappears for a while. And then x years pass, and the soil is refreshed for a new period of awe-inspiring games to grow.
 

Tigranes

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So you're saying every once in a while, they sell us a shiny trebuchet that doesn't really work, and hit some home runs - until people get sick of trebuchets that won't fire?

There might be something to that, though that gives people a lot more credit than I'd like (namely, that they eventually see through the shiny polish and get sick of the emptiness inside).
 

ItsChon

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Sure. But I don't necessarily think it's that simple.

What if a game was made using the exact same mechanics as seen in other Telltale Games, but the narrative of the game was amazing. Planescape: Torment levels of greatness, or whatever other game you want to use. Wouldn't the people who don't mind a game with the QTE mechanics still enjoy it, and be all for another game as long as it was of equal quality to the originals story? I don't think it's a coincidence that people started to shit on the Walking Dead and other such games when the quality between Season 1 and 2 was substantially worse.
 

LESS T_T

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Official confirmation:



DnpfRXSUYAEqIkY.jpg



Statement by co-founder and former CEO Kevin Bruner (which also sued the studio over his expulsion): https://www.brunerhouse.com/blog/2018/9/21/telltale-closure

Telltale closure.

Today is a very, very sad day.

I left Telltale a year and a half ago after an extended period where the Board of Directors and I had very different visions of Telltale’s future and how we might get there. That was one of the hardest times of my professional life, but in the end the company is controlled by its Board of Directors and I respected their decisions throughout.

As a co-founder, I take an enormous amount of pride that we were able to build the kind of games that I am immensely passionate about creating, exploring, evolving, and perfecting (if that’s even possible). We built a significant new brand, helped define a new genre, and thrived for more than a decade.

We pursued projects that no one else would consider. The Walking Dead, Tales from the Borderlands, The Wolf Among Us, Batman, Minecraft, Puzzle Agent, Poker Night and Sam & Max are the kind of projects I personally loved and I poured my heart and soul into each one. Those are the kind of projects no other publisher or studio would touch. We chose to venture where others dared not go, and we found some success along the way. It took a lot of vision, luck, will power, teamwork, talent, and very long days and nights to get there, but it will forever have been worth it.

And we did it all while growing, attracting some of the most talented people I’ve ever known. We were equally passionate about making sure our employees always had a home. Prior to my leaving, we were able to avoid sweeping layoffs and (somehow) managed to ensure that we always had work for everyone. We worked hard and sometimes it seemed like we had more than we could handle but we stuck together and forged ahead.

Today, I’m mostly saddened for the people who are losing their jobs at a studio they love. And I’m also saddened at the loss of a studio that green-lit crazy ideas that no one else would consider. I’m comforted a bit knowing there are now so many new talented people and studios creating games in the evolving narrative genre. While I look forward to those games and new developments, and continuing to contribute, I will always find “A Telltale Game” to have been a unique offering.

I know that Telltale will be remembered fondly for what it has done best.

Kevin

co-founder, Telltale Games.
 

lophiaspis

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I don't think it's a coincidence that people started to shit on the Walking Dead and other such games when the quality between Season 1 and 2 was substantially worse.

This is the main reason IMO. They simply couldn't maintain the level of WDS1. I don't think stagnant graphics or the old engine would have caused problems if they had kept the same storytelling quality. But those guys left to make Firewatch and nobody could fill their shoes. Goes to show that it's all about unique talent, especially in such a narrative focused genre.
 

imweasel

Guest
Telltale just kept on pumping out the same shit that nobody was really interested in. I personally completely lost interest in everything they make after playing The Walking Dead Season 2, which was a huge pile of steaming shit.

I somehow doubt that this will truly be the end though. Former employees will probably get together to form Telltale #2.
 

Eyestabber

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Quite insulting that these hacks had "games" in their name. The shit they produce are "games" only in the same sense Amy Schumer is "funny" and Brianna Wu is a "woman".
 

DeepOcean

Arcane
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Messages
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Sorry but it is simple for me:

No gameplay = Good Fucking Riddance!

Ohh the joy I feel reading the sadness and the tears of all those hacks working on hipster gaming sites that made endless articles how TellTale crap was the future of story telling on gaming. Dear God, cinematic gaming needs to die ASAP.

Good Fucking Riddance!
 

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