Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Vapourware Trials of Ascension – Steam

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
Trials of a Scamcion – Steam

Since I’ve step foot on the Greed Monger juicy thread I’ve been wanting to make a thread about Trials of Ascension, but I’ve been to lazy to re-cap this entire shit show, however, today is the day! Hell, where do I even start? Oh, I know! Marty, we have to go back, to 2001!


When Don Danielson (Brax) and his team “Shadow Pool”, registered the domain and announced what was supposedly going to be most innovating MMORPG ever, Trials of Ascension! It was pretty much the kind of video game where you can do whatever the fuck you want to do, you have a bazillion races to pick from, you can be a pixie, a dragon, a human, a gay ass golden fish, it doesn’t matter, because when imagination is the limit, as long as you don’t run out of toilet paper to write on, it is whatever the hell you want it to be.


Sadly, who knew that you need to know anything about game development at all to make an MMORPG, after going trough multiple game engines only to realize that shit was a little more complicated than using RPG Maker, the community started asking for proof that the project was more than just vaporware, however instead of proof, the “led-developer” Brax provided them with the dire news that despite getting multiple funding offers from big companies, all of them supposedly came with the price of turning Trials of Ascension into some sort of World of Warcraft clone, something that they just couldn’t accept, thus around 2008 the project was shut down without having anything to show for due the lack of capital.


In 2012, Trials of Ascension made it’s come back! Can you guess why? Golden age of crowdfunding! If a random guy can get 55,000$ for a potato salad, why wouldn’t the most innovating MMORPG be also showered with free money, am I right? Under the new team name “Forged Chaos”, Brax quickly launched his first Kickstarter:


Surprisingly, just concept art alone wasn’t enough to get those juicy free dolla dolla from backers.


image.jpg


You see, the problem is (spoiler alert) that despite going around claiming to have experience in game development, the truth is that none of them knew jack-shit about it, they couldn’t even code a basic calculator even if their life's depended on it, let alone at least a demo for a MMORPG, therefore it was time for Plan B:


The Trials of Ascension Store! To sum it up, it’s basically a Store that used to sell inexistent items & services for an inexistent video game, that according to the “Backers Agreement” it wasn’t even really a Store at all, it was a complex donation system with rewards! Thus, regardless the amount money you threw at it, you weren’t really owed shit for it. Over 60,000$ later they finally hired someone who could program, Teddy, who was given the task of creating a technical demo in order to give that juicy Kickstarter a second go… but as it turns out, those 60k must have burned up pretty quickly, ending up with Teddy leaving right before the launch of the new Kickstarter campaign, and despite of not even knowing how to turn on the god damn servers, they still went ahead with it:


It turned out as expected, a fucking catastrophe, still this is when shit starts getting fun, as some fairly generous backers started calling them on their incompetence, and as some more member of the team left, such as one of the “team leaders” Xanward , leaving us articles such as this:


This is the moment when Forged Chaos jumps into damage control, giving us some threads of pure gold:


As that didn’t worked out to well, they started censoring shit little by little, it started slowly by locking every thread where the community was discussing their failure:

Untitled.jpg


But that wasn’t enough, new people could still pass by and see that entire shit show, thus they purged most of the forum, deleting anything that they deemed negative towards the project:

Untitled12.jpg


As you may guess though, it doesn’t end here, why should it? I mean, why do you even need cash, when you can get people working for you for free!?! That’s fucking right, this was the moment they arrived to the brilliant conclusion that maybe, just maybe! A fucking MMORPG was a tad little bit overreaching, therefore the project was scaled down from a MMORPG to a yet another sandbox survival game, and trough the help of a countless “volunteers” (trust me, I tried counting them up, but so many of them joined just to bail right after through the years that I just gave up) they started building up something to throw at the Steam Store, with the objective of making enough money to go back to the MMORPG version, that said, as long as you claimed to know anything about game development and were crazy enough to work for free, welcome aboard!

This bring us the present day, after years of a snail-paced development, a true master piece was finally born: https://store.steampowered.com/app/893870/Trials_of_Ascension_Exile/





~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


This pretty much sums the basics up, however there is still some information that I would like to share and some points that I would like to highlight about this project, let’s start with the scam part, shall we? What’s a scam?

Scam: a fraudulent or deceptive act or operation

Deceptive: tending or having power to cause someone to accept as true or valid what is false or invalid : tending or having power to deceive.

Let’s go trough that post from the led-developer again, shall we:

We have experience. No, we don’t have a launched title under out belt (yet!) but we spent YEARS not just building a fully-functional prototype, but learning every angle of game development, from creating the pipelines and art/coding standards to proper testing methods (white, black, smoke, etc).

Source: http://i1244.photobucket.com/albums/gg570/MyobiPT/Trials of Ascension/Forum Posts n Threads/image.jpg


Those claims are pretty big for someone who is accepting others people money in order to accomplish a video game, they also go against what is stated AFTER both Kickstarters and the Store closed up:

The three original founders are not qualified to build ToA by ourselves. How’s that for a clear, blunt, and candid statement?

We are not experts in engineering, animation, modeling, nor are we audio specialists. We are designers at heart. We each certainly have traits that lend to the support and structuring of ToA such as my web development, digital illustration and editing skills, Varl’s incredible ability to storytell and create the overaching consistent lore of the world and Loestri’s way with keeping our books in order and steering us clear of the many operational landmines we’ve avoided.

Source 1: http://photobucket.com/gallery/user...ZvcnVtIFBvc3RzIG4gVGhyZWFkcy8xNi5qcGc=/?ref=1

Source 2: https://web.archive.org/web/2015050...ads/to-our-fans-both-present-and-future.4710/

Brax misled and bluntly lied to his community about his professional experience, while accepting their money through Kickstarter and a self-made donation system to develop a product that he was fully aware that at the time no one in his team had the skills to even start developing. By definition, this project is/was a scam.



That said, I want to remind you that sadly due their forum clean up, there is a lot that has been lost. I took multiple screen shots of the shit revolving around the development of this game, unfortunately it has been so many years that what I kept in my hard drive has been long lost, and lot of the content I've upload to photobucket got messed up with some sort of changes made to the website, making the pictures of full threads completely unreadable due the resolution.... luckily, we have the Way Back Machine and some scraps of what I've uploaded!



Let's start with Teddy's post on the entire issue after he left:

Im under NDA so I cant talk about the other expenses, but ill shoot out this number since I was given permission and I think you guys deserve to know where your money was spent in a very specific way. I have nothing to hide.


I was paid 23,000 last year at a rate of initially 500/week, 4 months later increased to 700/week. This year I was payed again 700/wk untill 2/18. I Left FC one day before the KS campaign started because me and the three owners had some disagreements/trust issues. After I left, I still consulted with them over a few things like teaching Yevi/Brax how to turn on the servers and as well as fixing some left over bugs.

In total its been just about $28,500 pre-tax.


...ON a bit of a separate note though, I wish I could be streaming the demo to you all and have you all play the game, because when some people are saying the graphics are "from the 1900's" or something I just cringe thinking that they are unaware of the games current state. The demo itself is actually quite far I think considering the circumstances of me being the one programmer and only a year to develop. I would LOVE to go over EVERY SINGLE feature that is currently coded in the game, but I cant due to the NDA, and me not being part of FC anymore. In regards to the graphics though, I did a side by side comparison of ToA, and H1Z1.http://postimg.org/image/n9mt77dix/
In my opinion, its not that far off graphically. Their model is maybe a bit better? but overall? ...maybe I just don't see it? Have I just been looking at it too long? I don't think graphics are the problem here.

I talked to a fan in real life who I met at a local game development group I go to, who has been following the game for years. 2 days before KS I talked with him and asked what he thought of the Raknar race that walks on walls. He responded with (again, 2 days before kick-starter) "The Raknar is in game?" ... Raknar have been in game for at least 2 months now? So how is it that he doesn't know? There is just a huge lack in sharing and transparency into the development.

I'm honestly confused as to why people think the game looks like shit/has nothing in it/Same as 6 months ago with unity default X... when I go to MMO-C or something. (I know I shouldn't go there, but I cant help myself). I mean, I am not stupid, I am VERY honest with myself, and am not AT ALL afraid to admit that something I created sucks if it really does. But common, really? I am still convinced people are saying this game looks like shit because either their expectations were way to high for a demo, or they haven't got their hands on it. perhaps your asking how can I be so blissfully ignorant? I dont think its ignorance, because when we did testing with our 25+ testers, people were having fun. Its as simple as that.

Me and Kaoshae messed around with the melee combat just dueling for hours after a test. We left the servers on overnight as a thank you for helping record the KS video, and people stayed on ALL NIGHT building a maze structure, a giant palace, and other cool creations. People would stay after recordings and just **** around for hours. No one does that if the game is total shit. People play the raknar, go into a cave, crawl around on the ceiling and without fail, every person says "damn this is cool". Every single person.

So why is it that we cant convey that to the masses? Honestly this is partly what me & owners disagreed on was the amount of transparency, but that was not my job or my decision. I would love nothing more then to have the game be streamed on twitch, give a hundred+ people clients, and just go at it. (at this point there isnt much to lose?) And I don't even work for FC anymore, but to see people shit on what I did over the past year because they just don't know and assume the worst, damn...of course I want to fix that. (in case you are wondering, I cant "just do it" because I am under an NDA)

That being said, the demo is not a legendary piece of software that will magically change everyone's opinion, but I guess I just feel there are a lot of uninformed accusations which is mostly the fault of ToA PR and lack of transparency into the development. Some of you will hate the game no matter what, but I truly feel that some of you would have a change of mind if you saw a stream, or got your hands on it. Is it possible that the testers were all having fun because they were long time fans, and just enjoyed being part of the process? Maybe, but I really don't think so, and if that was the case, then shame on me for thinking otherwise and getting outside opinions. I would love to get informed feedback on what your think sucks so I can make it better in my next game. Its just sad to me though when people assume there is nothing there, because its not being shared well.

ALL that being said though, lack of transparency and not sharing is only one of the various reasons the KS is not looking so hot. To me though, tis just the one reason that I am most closely related to, so I care more about it? I already asked and there was no response, but Maybe Brax will lift my NDA and I will be able to share a little more in regards to the game itself. As he said in the OP, I personally feel the demo is far beyond what many games come to KS with; just need to show it.

By Teddy ex-ToA Programmer
@teddynashor


The answer to a question of a community on how the funds were being distributed trough the project (at least is was a believable answer?):

Beerandhookers.jpg




Lil Note: Many members of the ToA community blamed "trolls" (members of the forum MMO-Champion forum that were discussing the project there.) for the failure of both Kickstarters, thus why I've waited a couple of months after it's release to make this thread. According to https://steamcharts.com/app/893870, the game had an average of 4.1 players online the last 30 days... go figure.


Update#1: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/trials-of-ascension-–-steam.124004/#post-6316873

Update#2: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/trials-of-ascension-–-steam.124004/#post-6693017
 
Last edited:

Norfleet

Moderator
Joined
Jun 3, 2005
Messages
12,250
I still don't understand why anyone would "back" anything given that they never offer anything like, oh, say, an actual return on investment. What do *I* get for investing in YOUR product? Why should I give MY money to make YOU rich? Asking for donations when you're making a free product is one thing, but if it's a commercial product intended to produce profit for you, what's in it for me?
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
I still don't understand why anyone would "back" anything given that they never offer anything like, oh, say, an actual return on investment. What do *I* get for investing in YOUR product? Why should I give MY money to make YOU rich? Asking for donations when you're making a free product is one thing, but if it's a commercial product intended to produce profit for you, what's in it for me?

For the same reason that people would “volunteer” to work in a indie game where the 3 “led-developers” can’t program, model, animate or back up the project financially, because they are just “designers” at heart, meaning they will just sit there and tell you how they want shit done…
 

AMG

Arbiter
Joined
Sep 15, 2012
Messages
374
I still don't understand why anyone would "back" anything given that they never offer anything like, oh, say, an actual return on investment. What do *I* get for investing in YOUR product? Why should I give MY money to make YOU rich? Asking for donations when you're making a free product is one thing, but if it's a commercial product intended to produce profit for you, what's in it for me?
You get a game that you'd presumably like to play, which wouldn't be made otherwise.
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
You get a game that you'd presumably like to play, which wouldn't be made otherwise.

You MIGHT get a game that you'd presumably like to play.

It's a pretty risky deal for the backer, unless it's a company that proven to be trustworthy, and you really want to support it, I just wouldn't recommend.
 

thesheeep

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 16, 2007
Messages
9,939
Location
Tampere, Finland
Codex 2012 Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Torment: Tides of Numenera Codex USB, 2014 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
You get a game that you'd presumably like to play, which wouldn't be made otherwise.

You MIGHT get a game that you'd presumably like to play.

It's a pretty risky deal for the backer, unless it's a company that proven to be trustworthy, and you really want to support it, I just wouldn't recommend.
That is ridiculous.
What are 20-30$ for the chance to get a good game? Not much.
Worst case: You lose 20-30$ for nothing. *shrug* But even then you sometimes get sweet drama.
Best case: You get a game you like for cheaper than normal.

Of course, one should still look into WHO is doing the actual campaign and if they have a ... history ;)
I probably wouldn't back anything by Chris Roberts again. Not because I don't think SC will ever be released, but because I won't back something that might not be released in my lifetime.
 

spectre

Arcane
Joined
Oct 26, 2008
Messages
5,381
Didn't read the thread, but Tales of Scamcoin, is it about cryptocurrency?
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
You get a game that you'd presumably like to play, which wouldn't be made otherwise.

You MIGHT get a game that you'd presumably like to play.

It's a pretty risky deal for the backer, unless it's a company that proven to be trustworthy, and you really want to support it, I just wouldn't recommend.
That is ridiculous.
What are 20-30$ for the chance to get a good game? Not much.
Worst case: You lose 20-30$ for nothing. *shrug* But even then you sometimes get sweet drama.
Best case: You get a game you like for cheaper than normal.

Of course, one should still look into WHO is doing the actual campaign and if they have a ... history ;)
I probably wouldn't back anything by Chris Roberts again. Not because I don't think SC will ever be released, but because I won't back something that might not be released in my lifetime.

What's 20-30$? A fairly decent full scam-risk free game on Steam.

... and you don't lose 20-30$ for nothing, to lose them to some asshole who will be cruising around the world laughing at all the people who "just" threw 20-30 bucks at him.

Don't get me wrong, I'm aware of the awesome fucking games that came to life thanks to crowdfunding, I mean, I'm a huge fan of Divinity Original Sin myself, I would back Larian Studios any time, but projects like this one, Greed Monger, Star Citizen and countless others that show up making big promises without much to show for can just fuck off straightaway.
 

DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth
Trials of a Scamcion – Steam​

Since I’ve step foot on the Greed Monger juicy thread I’ve been wanting to make a thread about Trials of Ascension, but I’ve been to lazy to re-cap this entire shit show, however, today is the day! Hell, where do I even start? Oh, I know! Marty, we have to go back, to 2001!


When Don Danielson (Brax) and his team “Shadow Pool”, registered the domain and announced what was supposedly going to be most innovating MMORPG ever, Trials of Ascension! It was pretty much the kind of video game where you can do whatever the fuck you want to do, you have a bazillion races to pick from, you can be a pixie, a dragon, a human, a gay ass golden fish, it doesn’t matter, because when imagination is the limit, as long as you don’t run out of toilet paper to write on, it is whatever the hell you want it to be.

...Wait, you mean to tell me that I can be a 'gay ass golden fish' in this game?

Where the fuck do I sign up?

Interesting read and although ive heard of this game I had no idea it was this much of a mess.

- These scam developers seem to try and hit on a niche. The 'gay ass golden fish' niche is very under represented in games these days and many are willing to risk money to be able to relive their gay ass fish glory days of yore.
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
...Wait, you mean to tell me that I can be a 'gay ass golden fish' in this game?

Where the fuck do I sign up?

Interesting read and although ive heard of this game I had no idea it was this much of a mess.

- These scam developers seem to try and hit on a niche. The 'gay ass golden fish' niche is very under represented in games these days and many are willing to risk money to be able to relive their gay ass fish glory days of yore.


I'm sorry bearer of bad news, but no, not anymore.

Twenty Five Races:

TerVarus is populated by a myriad range of civilized creatures, from the tiny and delicate fey pixie to the towering and mighty relic dragon. There are twenty five player races to choose from, each of whom have their own unique aptitudes and abilities, as well as their own preferences and rivalries.

Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20021210115836/http://www.shadowpool.com:80/features.shtml

See that was the original plan for the MMORPG version, 25 races, each one with their sort of unique playstyle (I’m sure it would be pretty balanced on a PvP based game), however, most of it got scrapped, I guess maybe, just maybe, it was a tad lil bit too fucking much.
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
Welp... RIP.

trials-of-derplings.jpg

Also, for those complaining about it being a long ass post, TL,DR version of it:

- 3 "game developers" wanted to make the most innovating MMORPG ever.
- They had no game developing skills nor the funds to hire people who had them.
- They tried to get the funding from companies, no success.
- They started 2 Kick Starters, both failed (4% & 11% of goal).
- They opened a store in their website selling non-existent in-game items for a yet-to-be-made video game.
- Earned over 60,000$ trough it thanks to their small delusional community.
- Hired one single programmer to develop the game... the money ran out, the programmer left.
- 3 lead "developers" couldn't even find out how to turn on the servers.
- Started "hiring".... "volunteers" to work on the project (now from scratch) for a percentage of the profits.
- Steam early access release.
- The "volunteers" were going faster than coming...
- No updates for around 1 year.
- Shut Down.

GG.
 
Last edited:

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
Bumpy bump time!

Apparently, this fucking thing is just like Greed Monger, it just refuses to stay dead.

It seems that this amazing IP was sold by an “undisclosed amount” of cash to another amazing team of developers, the same team behind the infamous game “Dragons of Ramrys”!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8ykxfQCr-pTqRTly7UMJww

... and it’s already looking really promising, just look at it:

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachme...784138051593/Hatchling_Roar_Test0001-0104.gif

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachme...599452921876/Hatchling_Walk_Test0001-0040.gif

I know, I know, just keep you wallets ready, as soon as we can throw money at it, I’ll warn you!
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
It's that time of the year bois, where a little update must be made.

ToA4.jpg



Remember how I told you to keep your wallets ready?


https://www.kicktraq.com/projects/285796064/trials-of-ascension-0/


Clearly you mothers fuckers didn’t gave a shit... but oh well, that’s okay! Because the show must go on…


Therefore, the developer had the original idea to start accepting donations ~

ToA1.jpg



… the problem is, without dat sweet honey, ya ain't catching no damn flies... or was it ants? bears?

ToA2.jpg


...so BAM!!! 15$ fuckin farret & 30$ edgy Toy Story t-rex right there! Aw yeah baby, I bet you weren't expecting the ToA-Store comeback!

Let's be honest now why shouldn't you carge as much as a awesome full-fledged video game such as The Witcher for a pet in an indie "MMORPG" during it's alpha phase, made by someone without any previous experience in game development, using Unit.. when he clearly can implement that unlike the previous developers:

ToA3.jpg


Especially when the Internet is full of people like this little fella here:

toa5.jpg
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
Last edited:

DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth


Roflmao! Holy shit, I can't believe you are that butthurt just because I poked a bit of fun at the fact that you keep making multi-posts 5 minutes apart from each other on the Fallout 76 thread, ahahahah ~ you goofy sheap.


Did you ever considered having that pineapple surgically removed out of your asshole? You could even start your own Kickstart or gofundme, I'll support you mate!
The Fallout 76 thread is serious business.
 

Myobi

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 26, 2016
Messages
1,356
The Fallout 76 thread is serious business.

I already apologized, okay!?! I knew it was serious, but never the kind of forced into marriage serious, and while he might be a good lookin lad, him screaming for Todd Howard by mistake during sex would just put me off, it would never work out.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom