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Vapourware Greed Monger Insider Thread (drama inside)

GM_JamesPro

Savant
Joined
Apr 1, 2015
Messages
118
Look I KNOW GM's Development was a mess. That's NOT how I run my teams that I have full control over. GM barely had a Design Document and what document we did have was only Created after a couple of us put our foot down and fought with Jason to make it. When I run a team we have very strict roles... Everyone knows what their job is and they do it. We have team discussions every night while we design every little aspect of the game we are working on. Every little thing is documented, Concept art is created, character sketches made up, and then those concepts/sketches are sent to our modelers who then model them. I've ran a team like this in the past and I will run a team like this again. The Team that we have put together in the last few weeks since taking over GM is a GOOD team. We have some holes to fill and we have to see how every one works together but in our discussions so far things are ticking... However we are getting away from the MMO Market for a while. We are taking a step back and developing some Mobile Games. When the time comes that we have the resources, man power, and the ability to get funding to attempt another MMO we WILL be back and we will set things right with all of GM's backers.
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
Look I KNOW GM's Development was a mess. That's NOT how I run my teams that I have full control over. GM barely had a Design Document and what document we did have was only Created after a couple of us put our foot down and fought with Jason to make it. When I run a team we have very strict roles... Everyone knows what their job is and they do it. We have team discussions every night while we design every little aspect of the game we are working on. Every little thing is documented, Concept art is created, character sketches made up, and then those concepts/sketches are sent to our modelers who then model them. I've ran a team like this in the past and I will run a team like this again. The Team that we have put together in the last few weeks since taking over GM is a GOOD team. We have some holes to fill and we have to see how every one works together but in our discussions so far things are ticking... However we are getting away from the MMO Market for a while. We are taking a step back and developing some Mobile Games. When the time comes that we have the resources, man power, and the ability to get funding to attempt another MMO we WILL be back and we will set things right with all of GM's backers.

Jesus christ man ...

I don't know if I should hand you a tissue or toilet paper.

The amount of pure shit that comes from your mouth is unfathomable.
 

Whiran

Magister
Joined
Feb 3, 2014
Messages
641
That's NOT how I run my teams that I have full control over. GM barely had a Design Document and what document we did have was only Created after a couple of us put our foot down and fought with Jason to make it. When I run a team we have very strict roles... Everyone knows what their job is and they do it. We have team discussions every night while we design every little aspect of the game we are working on. Every little thing is documented, Concept art is created, character sketches made up, and then those concepts/sketches are sent to our modelers who then model them. I've ran a team like this in the past and I will run a team like this again. The Team that we have put together in the last few weeks since taking over GM is a GOOD team. We have some holes to fill and we have to see how every one works together but in our discussions so far things are ticking... However we are getting away from the MMO Market for a while. We are taking a step back and developing some Mobile Games. When the time comes that we have the resources, man power, and the ability to get funding to attempt another MMO we WILL be back and we will set things right with all of GM's backers.
I am so confused.

From the reams of conversations and posts that were pasted into this thread it appeared that you were the "Project Lead" of Greed Monger. You even claimed the title.

From what I gathered and please correct me where I am wrong since I will admit that I glossed over a fair few pages of the drama scanning for amusing keywords you, GM_JamesPro claimed to have little programming experience prior to Greed Monger. So please enlighten me as to what "teams" you've led where you've had full control and also indicate what success you're claiming to have had with said teams.
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
I am so confused.

From the reams of conversations and posts that were pasted into this thread it appeared that you were the "Project Lead" of Greed Monger. You even claimed the title.

From what I gathered and please correct me where I am wrong since I will admit that I glossed over a fair few pages of the drama scanning for amusing keywords you, GM_JamesPro claimed to have little programming experience prior to Greed Monger. So please enlighten me as to what "teams" you've led where you've had full control and also indicate what success you're claiming to have had with said teams.

He's also claimed on multiple occasions to be the only person developing Greed Monger, and that there was no one else on the "team" besides himself.

Again ...

Toilet paper or tissue?

Does anyone else find it odd that the PR front-man Joel is also mysteriously absent ... Again?

At least he's smart enough to know when to bail out.
 

GM_JamesPro

Savant
Joined
Apr 1, 2015
Messages
118
That's NOT how I run my teams that I have full control over. GM barely had a Design Document and what document we did have was only Created after a couple of us put our foot down and fought with Jason to make it. When I run a team we have very strict roles... Everyone knows what their job is and they do it. We have team discussions every night while we design every little aspect of the game we are working on. Every little thing is documented, Concept art is created, character sketches made up, and then those concepts/sketches are sent to our modelers who then model them. I've ran a team like this in the past and I will run a team like this again. The Team that we have put together in the last few weeks since taking over GM is a GOOD team. We have some holes to fill and we have to see how every one works together but in our discussions so far things are ticking... However we are getting away from the MMO Market for a while. We are taking a step back and developing some Mobile Games. When the time comes that we have the resources, man power, and the ability to get funding to attempt another MMO we WILL be back and we will set things right with all of GM's backers.
I am so confused.

From the reams of conversations and posts that were pasted into this thread it appeared that you were the "Project Lead" of Greed Monger. You even claimed the title.

From what I gathered and please correct me where I am wrong since I will admit that I glossed over a fair few pages of the drama scanning for amusing keywords you, GM_JamesPro claimed to have little programming experience prior to Greed Monger. So please enlighten me as to what "teams" you've led where you've had full control and also indicate what success you're claiming to have had with said teams.

I don't know where your getting that before GM I had little Programming experience. I've been Programming since I was 18 or 19. I am now 30. I have taught my self C++, C#, Java, Python, HTML, PHP, MySQL (Databases), And then different Scripting Languages. I know each of these languages at different levels. After the past few years with Unity C# is by far my best language. I've created a Custom Game Engine using different C++ Libraries and I've taking on some Website Development Projects in the past. Joel and I have ran several teams together which ended in failed attempts because we always ran into issues with funding. GM was my first Funded MMO that I worked on and I wanted so badly to see it through to launch. However once again Funding became an issue. In the end before I left GM the first time aside from our QA Team I WAS the only one working on GM. When I left and Joel and I started up our own Company again we put a team together and there are now 12 of us on the team in different roles.

As for me being the Team Lead in the end Jason still had the final say on just about everything... He was the one with all of the ideas. Maybe when it came to the Design phase of GM I should have been more forceful about ensuring things got done properly. Maybe alot of these problems would have been avoided had I made sure everything was organized and smooth. However it's too late for that now. All I can do is take the lessons I've learned through this whole process and do things better next time.
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
You forgot the part about listing the teams you've lead that were successful ...

And you also forgot to stop blaming Jason Appleton for everything. Guess that's just a habit for you, at this point.
 

EJoe

Educated
Joined
Apr 3, 2015
Messages
96
James,

You could have stopped all your MMO things and focus on your website development. Websites... usually takes 1 person to do. I look at your website, http://www.riseofheroesmmo.com/ and it is:

Forbidden
You don't have permission to access / on this server.


It's not true that you have funding problems. You have Joel, who, for marketing, I haven't seen his marketing portfolio. You and Joel are doing fine job of fake-GM Public Relations and for past 3 or so years, spreading tons of negativity, perhaps, the finest kind of fake-PR I've ever seen.


If you have funding problems, you could have easily asked for cheap concept art from junior artists - years ago. Unless you are hiring scam-artists who charge US$80/hour for shitty artwork.


You are full of lies and nonsense.

No money to buy bags for T-Shirts, yet money to spend on $40 asset on Asset Store.
Soon, you'll have all the money for Android Tablet to test mobile games and Mac laptop for iPad for iOS mobile games...

No money for Greed monger, yet have money for 12 suddenly new employees.

No time to spend developing Greed Monger, spends all time instead making yet another MMO, then survival game, then mobile games...


Of all the past projects you did, I think you didn't stick around long enough to collect money, or the person waiting for you to finish their websites gave up on you.
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
I fucking love how quickly JamesP will change everything that he said previously. He now claims to know exactly where every penny of the project went:

"Yes like I said up until yesterday Jason had been refusing us access to the data. Yesterday though we did sit down with him and he DID make the data available to us and it does suggest that every penny went toward GM. Jason had some where else to be and so we didn't go over every little detail to account for every single penny but there enough data there that I wasn't aware of to suggest that it did in fact go to where it was supposed to go. We have screenshots of his Paypal records but he has asked us not to release them."

More bullshit, it seems.

"Oh yeah, all the previous research I claimed to have done was wrong. But I can't prove it, so you have to trust me!"
 

DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth
I fucking love how quickly JamesP will change everything that he said previously. He now claims to know exactly where every penny of the project went:

"Yes like I said up until yesterday Jason had been refusing us access to the data. Yesterday though we did sit down with him and he DID make the data available to us and it does suggest that every penny went toward GM. Jason had some where else to be and so we didn't go over every little detail to account for every single penny but there enough data there that I wasn't aware of to suggest that it did in fact go to where it was supposed to go. We have screenshots of his Paypal records but he has asked us not to release them."

More bullshit, it seems.

"Oh yeah, all the previous research I claimed to have done was wrong. But I can't prove it, so you have to trust me!"
I find that odd as well . I myself know a bit about this and from what I know far less than 30K had been accounted for (cant remember the exact amount 20K and change) unless you were to believe Appleton at his word (and who pays 20K alone for the housing which would be such a large portion of budget?) also discrepancies between what Appleton claimed to have paid and what other claimed was paid to them.

Hell, even getting an actual paper trail with actual black and white numbers was near impossible.

That was what I know the situation was as of yesterday morning.I know James and Joel approached jason to take back GM yesterday afternoon/evening and had conversation with him and he refused (probably laughed...I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall of the appleton household) and shorty after they closed up shop.

I have no reason to doubt James based on past interactions but I find this very...very odd nevertheless. I have myown feelings about what may have happened here involving some type of threat/intimidation/etc. but that is my own opinion and not something I was told from anyone- Its just...Odd.

Its odd the conversation about where the funding went happened at all during the time between asking jason to take GM back and closing it down. At that point- Why did it even matter? I mean to the backers, sure- But to the actual players involved?

I havnt seen the contract but would love to. I wonder if their obligation extended to having to complete the project or be in violation to Appleton.I mean, anything can be written into a contract and this one was written on a sunday evening over very little time without attorneys involved.Regardless, something changed within a few hours on that front.

This one I find hard to believe. I am taking james at his word here because he hasnt lied to me that im aware of and if he is not being forthright here (which i dont think he is) then I think there is a reason.

But IDK anything other than what he claims that now the money is magically accounted for- Which is almost impossible imho.

EDIT- I asked him on skype again and he insists its now accounted for. Thats all I know-Still dont really believe it but it is what it is. He stands firm and says he wasnt threatened or anything.
 
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InnitBruv

Literate
Joined
May 26, 2015
Messages
33
They all scammed people out of $100,000 and it was an utter failure. This is what those scammers and that failed game will all be known for...

I would bet my left nut sack that James knew the scam all along. If he had ANY integrity whatsoever, he would have washed his hands from the Greed Monger fiasco, 2-3 years ago and never looked back.

And please, do not come with the bullshit that he was trying to salvage the game and thinking about the backers. You are a fool for thinking so.
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
I find that odd as well . I myself know a bit about this and from what I know far less than 30K had been accounted for (cant remember the exact amount 20K and change) unless you were to believe Appleton at his word (and who pays 20K alone for the housing which would be such a large portion of budget?) also discrepancies between what Appleton claimed to have paid and what other claimed was paid to them.

Hell, even getting an actual paper trail with actual black and white numbers was near impossible.

That was what I know the situation was as of yesterday morning.I know James and Joel approached jason to take back GM yesterday afternoon/evening and had conversation with him and he refused (probably laughed...I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall of the appleton household) and shorty after they closed up shop.

I have no reason to doubt James based on past interactions but I find this very...very odd nevertheless. I have myown feelings about what may have happened here involving some type of threat/intimidation/etc. but that is my own opinion and not something I was told from anyone- Its just...Odd.

Its odd the conversation about where the funding went happened at all during the time between asking jason to take GM back and closing it down. At that point- Why did it even matter? I mean to the backers, sure- But to the actual players involved?

I havnt seen the contract but would love to. I wonder if their obligation extended to having to complete the project or be in violation to Appleton.I mean, anything can be written into a contract and this one was written on a sunday evening over very little time without attorneys involved.Regardless, something changed within a few hours on that front.

This one I find hard to believe. I am taking james at his word here because he hasnt lied to me that im aware of and if he is not being forthright here (which i dont think he is) then I think there is a reason.

But IDK anything other than what he claims that now the money is magically accounted for- Which is almost impossible imho.

EDIT- I asked him on skype again and he insists its now accounted for. Thats all I know-Still dont really believe it but it is what it is. He stands firm and says he wasnt threatened or anything.

It's not really surprising. James has, on multiple occasions, said one thing only to immediately refute it moments later. He's very misleading, tells half-truths, and often times tries to claim something before it's true, leading it to become a lie when it doesn't. Just days before, he swore up and down he had looked everywhere, contacted every team member, and tracked every penny spent because Jason Appleton wouldn't provide him with the information; suddenly now, just one day later, he knows where everything went. It's just all too convenient, again, that suddenly he can account for every penny, when he never mentioned it to backers upon announcing closure of the project. I suspect he's trying his best to cover for the scam, especially since he's gone with the "I can't show you, but just trust me" method of "proof".

I fail to believe he knows where every penny went or how it was spent. The video shown doesn't even look like it'd have been $100,000+ worth of assets and development time; I'm no developer, however, it's easy to tell the video shown was thrown together with minimal effort. There wasn't even a UI, which had been shown in previous versions of the game.

I'll still hold that it's a lie until actual proof of how the money was spent is posted.
 

DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth
I find that odd as well . I myself know a bit about this and from what I know far less than 30K had been accounted for (cant remember the exact amount 20K and change) unless you were to believe Appleton at his word (and who pays 20K alone for the housing which would be such a large portion of budget?) also discrepancies between what Appleton claimed to have paid and what other claimed was paid to them.

Hell, even getting an actual paper trail with actual black and white numbers was near impossible.

That was what I know the situation was as of yesterday morning.I know James and Joel approached jason to take back GM yesterday afternoon/evening and had conversation with him and he refused (probably laughed...I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall of the appleton household) and shorty after they closed up shop.

I have no reason to doubt James based on past interactions but I find this very...very odd nevertheless. I have myown feelings about what may have happened here involving some type of threat/intimidation/etc. but that is my own opinion and not something I was told from anyone- Its just...Odd.

Its odd the conversation about where the funding went happened at all during the time between asking jason to take GM back and closing it down. At that point- Why did it even matter? I mean to the backers, sure- But to the actual players involved?

I havnt seen the contract but would love to. I wonder if their obligation extended to having to complete the project or be in violation to Appleton.I mean, anything can be written into a contract and this one was written on a sunday evening over very little time without attorneys involved.Regardless, something changed within a few hours on that front.

This one I find hard to believe. I am taking james at his word here because he hasnt lied to me that im aware of and if he is not being forthright here (which i dont think he is) then I think there is a reason.

But IDK anything other than what he claims that now the money is magically accounted for- Which is almost impossible imho.

EDIT- I asked him on skype again and he insists its now accounted for. Thats all I know-Still dont really believe it but it is what it is. He stands firm and says he wasnt threatened or anything.

It's not really surprising. James has, on multiple occasions, said one thing only to immediately refute it moments later. He's very misleading, tells half-truths, and often times tries to claim something before it's true, leading it to become a lie when it doesn't. Just days before, he swore up and down he had looked everywhere, contacted every team member, and tracked every penny spent because Jason Appleton wouldn't provide him with the information; suddenly now, just one day later, he knows where everything went. It's just all too convenient, again, that suddenly he can account for every penny, when he never mentioned it to backers upon announcing closure of the project. I suspect he's trying his best to cover for the scam, especially since he's gone with the "I can't show you, but just trust me" method of "proof".

I fail to believe he knows where every penny went or how it was spent. The video shown doesn't even look like it'd have been $100,000+ worth of assets and development time; I'm no developer, however, it's easy to tell the video shown was thrown together with minimal effort. There wasn't even a UI, which had been shown in previous versions of the game.

I'll still hold that it's a lie until actual proof of how the money was spent is posted.
I dont think he knows where the money went either. I know he didnt as of a couple days ago and there was a ton unaccounted for. Why he changed his tune I can only guess. Again, he is telling me there were no threats and jason suddenly decided to provide proof after all this time.

Sound suspicious? Yep, you bet.

I think he was somehow threatened even though he denies it.

There is no way in hell they have anything close to 100K+ in assets , work and payroll. No fucking way.... But im the dark here as much as everyone else on this one. I only have my opinion.
 

EJoe

Educated
Joined
Apr 3, 2015
Messages
96
My feeling is that James is vulnerable...


The moment someone spills the beans that he's able body enough to work and may lose his welfare, you can imagine what happens next...
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
OMG! We finally have PROOF that James Proctor can code something:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ali4KitvN3g

http://www.kongregate.com/games/JimP14/earth-defense

This is literally the funniest thing I have ever seen in my entire life. This is the only thing that's half way playable that he has ever produced, and he immediately jumped into wanting to program a large scale MMO/Multiplayer game.

I didn't think it could get funnier, but it has.

:bravo:

(EDIT: Just read that one of the backers is looking to possibly start a suit against Appleton/Proctor:

"If anyone is understanding some legal stuff about KS and such, and he thinks Appleton could still be sued, and he wants to start a combined action against him (US Resident) I will gladly make a try. Scammers should never get away easily.")
 
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DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth
By the way, at the time that game was posted (Nov 2011) James Proctor couldn't even figure out how to encode a score tracker into the game. Not one year later, he was playing the part of "Lead Programmer" for Greed Monger. Jason Appleton couldn't have picked a better pawn to play the part.
I'm in total agreement. I dont think this was accidental.

I sure as hell cant program myself "hello world" with a damn tutorial. I love playing with rpog maker and tyranobuilder but i cant even script so i use other peoples so I respect the hell out of anyone who can program anything at all. I'm not knocking james because that game doesnt look bad tome at all and if the blocks were replaced with ships and such it would make a fun little game. I WISH I had the knowledge to program that. I am working on a visual novel and am using a 'digital novel builder 'program since I am ignorant in coding so I think making any game from scratch is cool as hell and I envy you guys.

but your point is spot on , I think.
 

EJoe

Educated
Joined
Apr 3, 2015
Messages
96
He forgot to attach Kongrate to a GameObject in the game scene...


(Disclosure: I know the Kongregate owners personally)
 
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ElectricCrow

Novice
Joined
Oct 24, 2012
Messages
1
I'm going to explain what I THINK has happened over the past few days and that's it. I'm not going to go into a full blown explanation of the game, how it ended up here or point fingers. This is the only time I'm going to chime in here and I'm walking away for good. After agreeing to give GM to James and Joel (our contract came from a legal service, not just made up on a whim) I simply washed my hands of this and moved on for an endless list of reasons. A few days ago, James messaged me asking me to show where the funds went. Going back years into my financial records was a very mind bending task and at first I declined. Simply because I didn't have to. However, they brought up some discrepancies that I explained they were far off about and just flat out wrong and of course it turned into a "prove it" argument. So I spent about an hour with them finally showing them screenshot after screenshot of not only what they were directly wrong about, but many other things to show them how the money was used, which was to a lot of developers, graphics guys, assets, licenses, etc etc, a lot of which James had apparently forgotten about entirely. But I had to go and left it at that.

What I think this boiled down to was simple. They did what they did to take over Greed Monger expecting to have funding to see it through from where it was (although I wasn't aware this outside funding was even an issue or a must have for them to complete the game as I was under the impression they had a full volunteer team to finish everything) and when that funding apparently fell through, they panicked and James figured he could launch a smaller game to generate some revenue to then use to finish GM. Some images were leaked from people on his FB and all hell broke loose once again. They then came to me asking about where the money went, I assume now because they wanted to make sure that if they closed the project and any form of legal action came about, I was at least able to show that the money wasn't squandered or used to buy a fishing boat or something. It wasn't, I showed them that (at the time I just wanted to prove I wasn't lying and to prove them wrong about their personal claims) but they wanted to be able to close shop on the game until they got their ducks in a row without worrying about recourse, as is my opinion.

I know this was all a mess and I wont go into details about how or why things worked out the way they did. We did work for years to create an MMO game for $100k. I even had outside investment help toward the end. When we launched the KS the game was originally supposed to be much more simplistic. A cross between Salem and Ultima Online. James and I were a team, though I was the front man for everything. I took all of the hits so he could stay away from the madness and focus on results that I figured would ultimately clear my name in the end when the game was done.

I used the money for development, plain and simple. I had them agree not to publicly release the screenshots because I dont need mine or anyone elses financial information all over the web for obvious reasons.

To call this all a scam is just an easy way to drum up negative support against what we attempted to do and I get it. But the fact is, we certainly tried to do what I now know is impossible. Build and MMO with a lot of community involvement on a small budget. I learned the hard way that unless you have the funds to hire a team working out of your office that you can observe, monitor and have direct control over full time, you're already dead in the water. We had a sizable team for a while, but from my experience, everyone was out to take what they could and deliver little in return and to be honest, the community blasting us from inception all over the web not only put undue pressure on the team members but was ultimately cause for the game being a failure. It's difficult to find the help you need, paid or otherwise when everyone thinks badly about what you're trying to accomplish. I dont mean that to sound like excuses, but the community didn't help.

I'm sorry things worked out the way they did but I honestly did everything in my power to see this game through and never gave up on supporting James until the very end when I finally decided to give everything I had to James and Joel. It was my last ditch effort to see the game get finished knowing I would never see a dime for everything I had personally dealt with, suffered through, all of the stress and trials I had to contend with over the past 3 years. IT was either James and his newly resurfacing friend take their ball and go home, or I give them everything and let them finish it for all of the glory. I figured I'd rather see the game done, whatever it took.

I am simply done. They own everything and what they do with it all is up to them. I'd like to think they will get their ducks in a row and continue working on GM as I don't see James just walking away. I think they would rather the community think they are done and let things die down so that they can work on the game without all of the pressure put on by the public. But thats my opinion. The MMO forum community is a very big cross to bear, especially for James as I've told him COUNTLESS times to stay off the forums and focus on finishing the game. Showing the public a completed game will say all you will ever need to say to them and until then, everything else is just BS or troll food. But James can't help himself when it comes to forums for some reason.

I doubt this will clear anything up for anyone but I wanted to try.

Be well.
 

Dissident

Barely Literate
Joined
May 28, 2015
Messages
1
First post and probably last. Just wanted to say Greed Monger is what happens when a salesman and a dreamer hook up. It's a self-feeding daisy chain of smoke and CYA.

Back in 2012, Greed Monger sounded like a very badass game even though it had a terrible name. Like many, many others, I tossed in what I was willing to gamble and took confidence from those willing to toss in far more. Three years later, I can't say I'm surprised at the result. But it's been a long ride and there always seemed to be hope.

As I recall from years of pre-alpha discussions on the forums, I'd guess that most of the money has been spent foolishly but legitimately. They changed the engine and assets several times, acquiring various licenses and upgrades along the way. They also had a larger team at the start and folks had to get paid. I remember it was a big deal when they remade the map and all the parcels, and they hired a guy to do that specific job.

After being involved for three years, I think DarKPenguiN pretty much has the right of it re James. He's always bounced around a bit on ideas but has also been consistent re intent; he's a religious fellow and takes it seriously, so it's not his style to do deliberate ripoffs. I feel sorry for the mess he's in, but he did go after and grab that brass ring so now it's his mess to settle.

Anyway, just tossing in a little history from the KS backer side. This thread is pretty awesome: weird, sad, amazing, hilarious, /facepalm...
 

DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth
I'm going to explain what I THINK has happened over the past few days and that's it. I'm not going to go into a full blown explanation of the game, how it ended up here or point fingers. This is the only time I'm going to chime in here and I'm walking away for good. After agreeing to give GM to James and Joel (our contract came from a legal service, not just made up on a whim) I simply washed my hands of this and moved on for an endless list of reasons. A few days ago, James messaged me asking me to show where the funds went. Going back years into my financial records was a very mind bending task and at first I declined. Simply because I didn't have to. However, they brought up some discrepancies that I explained they were far off about and just flat out wrong and of course it turned into a "prove it" argument. So I spent about an hour with them finally showing them screenshot after screenshot of not only what they were directly wrong about, but many other things to show them how the money was used, which was to a lot of developers, graphics guys, assets, licenses, etc etc, a lot of which James had apparently forgotten about entirely. But I had to go and left it at that.

What I think this boiled down to was simple. They did what they did to take over Greed Monger expecting to have funding to see it through from where it was (although I wasn't aware this outside funding was even an issue or a must have for them to complete the game as I was under the impression they had a full volunteer team to finish everything) and when that funding apparently fell through, they panicked and James figured he could launch a smaller game to generate some revenue to then use to finish GM. Some images were leaked from people on his FB and all hell broke loose once again. They then came to me asking about where the money went, I assume now because they wanted to make sure that if they closed the project and any form of legal action came about, I was at least able to show that the money wasn't squandered or used to buy a fishing boat or something. It wasn't, I showed them that (at the time I just wanted to prove I wasn't lying and to prove them wrong about their personal claims) but they wanted to be able to close shop on the game until they got their ducks in a row without worrying about recourse, as is my opinion.

I know this was all a mess and I wont go into details about how or why things worked out the way they did. We did work for years to create an MMO game for $100k. I even had outside investment help toward the end. When we launched the KS the game was originally supposed to be much more simplistic. A cross between Salem and Ultima Online. James and I were a team, though I was the front man for everything. I took all of the hits so he could stay away from the madness and focus on results that I figured would ultimately clear my name in the end when the game was done.

I used the money for development, plain and simple. I had them agree not to publicly release the screenshots because I dont need mine or anyone elses financial information all over the web for obvious reasons.

To call this all a scam is just an easy way to drum up negative support against what we attempted to do and I get it. But the fact is, we certainly tried to do what I now know is impossible. Build and MMO with a lot of community involvement on a small budget. I learned the hard way that unless you have the funds to hire a team working out of your office that you can observe, monitor and have direct control over full time, you're already dead in the water. We had a sizable team for a while, but from my experience, everyone was out to take what they could and deliver little in return and to be honest, the community blasting us from inception all over the web not only put undue pressure on the team members but was ultimately cause for the game being a failure. It's difficult to find the help you need, paid or otherwise when everyone thinks badly about what you're trying to accomplish. I dont mean that to sound like excuses, but the community didn't help.

I'm sorry things worked out the way they did but I honestly did everything in my power to see this game through and never gave up on supporting James until the very end when I finally decided to give everything I had to James and Joel. It was my last ditch effort to see the game get finished knowing I would never see a dime for everything I had personally dealt with, suffered through, all of the stress and trials I had to contend with over the past 3 years. IT was either James and his newly resurfacing friend take their ball and go home, or I give them everything and let them finish it for all of the glory. I figured I'd rather see the game done, whatever it took.

I am simply done. They own everything and what they do with it all is up to them. I'd like to think they will get their ducks in a row and continue working on GM as I don't see James just walking away. I think they would rather the community think they are done and let things die down so that they can work on the game without all of the pressure put on by the public. But thats my opinion. The MMO forum community is a very big cross to bear, especially for James as I've told him COUNTLESS times to stay off the forums and focus on finishing the game. Showing the public a completed game will say all you will ever need to say to them and until then, everything else is just BS or troll food. But James can't help himself when it comes to forums for some reason.

I doubt this will clear anything up for anyone but I wanted to try.

Be well.
I am amazed and dumbfounded- So james saw $100k accounted for.

Can I have clarification here please?
 

Intrigued007

Educated
Joined
May 4, 2015
Messages
62
I don't think we'll ever see actual financial records, DarKPenguiN. It's based on Jason Appleton's word alone, and we know how much that's worth.
 

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