IndustryGamers - Informing the Games Industry

Realtime Worlds' Former Employees Strike Out At Management

Posted August 25, 2010 by M.H. Williams

After the virtual dissolution of Realtime Worlds last week, a number of developers find themselves without a job and noticeably angry. A number of ex-team members have made their thoughts of the fall of the publisher public knowledge via personal blogs or anonymous posts at gaming news sites.

Luke Halliwell, who worked for Realtime for six years, had some choice words for his former bosses on his personal website.

“There had been mounting discontent internally about the competence of our top management – and what better proof could you need than this. How they could keep operating the company when they couldn’t even pay this month’s wages, I don’t know,” he wrote. “Presumably they continued to think we had a chance somehow; the behaviour of a deluded, greedy, addicted gambler.”

“We made a lot of other mistakes too, most of them more interesting and deserving of analysis than a failure to count how much money we had left in the bank – and at many different levels in the company. You don’t get to burn through $100m without, shall we say, some opportunities to have done things differently.”

Luke’s wife, Lucy Halliwell, also had a chance to air her grievances in the comments section.

“I have neither the class nor the restraint my husband has displayed. Dave Jones and Ian Hetherington have pissed away millions, they are getting away with not paying over 200 employees for the work that they have done and have fiddled their way to being able to buy back Project:MyWorld for cheap,” she wrote.

Over at Rock, Paper, Shotgun, a former RTW employee who wished to remain anonymous wrote, “I was genuinely shocked when I played the release candidate – I couldn’t believe Dave J[ones] would be willing to release this. All the issues that had driven me nuts about it were still there – the driving was poor (server-authoritative with no apparent client prediction, ergo horrendously lag intolerant), combat impact-less, and I found the performance of the game sub-par on what was a high-spec dev machine.”

“But the real killer, IMO, is the business model. This was out of the team’s hands. The problem was that management looked at the revenue they wanted to generate and priced accordingly, failing to realise (or care) that there are literally a dozen top quality, subscription free team based shooters. Many of which, now, have progression and persistence of some sort – for free,” he continued. “You can’t simply charge what you feel like earning and hope the paying public will agree with your judgement of value. Many of us within RTW were extremely nervous at APB’s prospects long before launch, and with good reason, as it turns out.”

“I think a huge part of the blame lies with Dave J[ones], though I can’t emphasize enough how nice a man he is personally; ultimately APB has torpedoed the company, and it failed largely under his creative leadership. It has other issues (technical, for instance), but the design and the business plan are largely down to him and the board, and they are what have failed so irrevocably for the rest of us."

Another anonymous poster claiming to be ex-Realtime Worlds wrote a condemnation over at GI.biz.

“It's certainly safe to say that dozens of lives are in complete tatters now, there were only 24 hours notice given that there would be no pay this month, one week before pay was due,” he wrote. “Those who are staying on during the administration process find themselves in another horrible situation. They end up in an even worse situation, as any local jobs will already be gone by the time they're looking.”

“During the speech in the canteen where Dave Jones, Gary Dale, and the administrators informed staff that Realtime Worlds was entering administration, Dave said that Realtime Worlds has always prided itself on being a family, and treating its staff exceptionally well. I can only imagine he didn't fully appreciate the magnitude of the bad situations some people find themselves in now through no fault of their own.”

Activision, Blitz Games Studio, and SCEE are among the studios that are offering positions to those displaced by Realtime’s demise. The MyWorld development team has already been reemployed due to interest in the title.

IndustryGamers hopes the rest of the employees and families affected by this land on their feet.

M.H. Williams has been writing in some form or another for ten years and has been a hardcore gamer since the NES first graced American shores.  You can catch him on Twitter as @AutomaticZen, Google+ as himself, or on his personal Facebook page.