General / Off-Topic FD- HALF YEAR REPORT

Espege

Espege
OamodSias said:
EVERYONE knows that a software house can only work on one project at a time. :rolleyes:
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Not if you're Blizzard. Then you can develop new Diablo III content, new World of Warcraft content, new Hearthstone edition, new Heroes of the Storm game and final Starcraft II chapter. :)
 

Pibbles

P
Rifter said:
I found this interesting... "Frontier also announced Elite: Dangerous 1.2, a second free expansion which further enhances multiplayer aspects of the game, would be released in March 2015 and that an early-access Beta program for the Apple Mac version of Elite: Dangerous will start in March 2015." how can they call what was in 1.1 and going to be 1.2 as expansions? They are not... An expansion is to extend upon already finished content.... ED is anything but that!
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I agree, it's highly disingenuous. But FD has no real news to put in this report, so it's all about massaging the tiny truths there are, some of which are negative right now, into things that seem more positive. Shareholders don't play the games they buy shares in, but they do read statements like that, which make it appear that FD are ahead of the game rather than on the backfoot trying to manage a rushed release, that many of the backers they so proudly call-out in the report believe is full of bugs and does not deliver the planned gameplay.

But they are not the first company to behave in this way, nor will they be the last. This is what happens when companies go public. The game changes entirely.

What people may consider taking from this, is how FD's rather precarious state drives them to exploit the avenues that will generate the best news for shareholders. It is not a given that this will be spending large amounts on developing ED, if there are other more newsworthy projects that come into play then they likely will consider those a more worthy use of resource.
 
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Sir.Tj

The Moderator who shall not be Blamed....
Volunteer Moderator
Sir.Tj
Marcns007 said:
Oh well they moved it off the front page to off-Topic, not sure why? I would say it was certainly about Frontier

Forum: Off-Topic
Discuss things not relating to Frontier. May contain cats.
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Hi,

The thread was originally started in the Elite Dangerous Discussion section. I moved it over to off topic as although it relates indirectly to ED it's more of a general discussion.

No hidden agenda, although some will probably think so ;)

The quote on the front page of the off topic section is
Off-Topic Discussion


Talk about anything you'd like in here not related to games, as long as it complies with the forum rules!
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Simple as that. :)
 

Pibbles

P
SiriusSeven said:
This could explain why David Braben has been quiet lately. If he speaks, investors listen. It's now got to be very carefully planned, lest there be legal action from investors.
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After Braben (initially) publicly said no one was getting a refund for 'offlinegate' he was most likely advised by his legal team to keep quiet for a bit. IF the share price had plummeted as a result of us having to take our planned joint legal action (such a joint action would have to go to RNS as it would be price sensitive information) then investors could have considered legal action for a FD director making a public statement like that and thereon driving legal recourse, because he obviously was not exactly aligned with the law as it stands in the EU on the point of those refunds. So yes, it's very possible that is the case.

Once FD IPOd they were tied into the AIM framework and their NOMAD would have to be all over things like that, quite possibly Braben's own fellow directors asked him to zip it for a bit also.
 
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QziQza

QziQza
Han Yolo said:
fair enough. I have no clue about their business model. I was merely pointing out that they did a lot of other questionable decisions and therefor it would not suprise me if they actually got the "steam thingy" wrong too.
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ahh, i get where you are coming from, appologies for reading it wrong :)
 

Dashing Blade

Dashing Blade
Pibbles said:
. . . IF the share price had plummeted as a result of us having to take our planned joint legal action (such a joint action would have to go to RNS as it would be price sensitive information) . . .
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Incorrect on two counts, firstly, personal or corporate actions against a quoted company would not be deemed "price sensitive information", second, price sensitive information is not defined by how the share price moves.

If this genuinely was the legal advise you received, then I would consider taking legal action against your advisors.
 

Cmdr Eagleboy

Cmdr Eagleboy
Just love speculations without even understanding what half of these numbers means (especially Steam one, no matter how I would love to see ED coming to Steam Machine (and Linux), not happening at least for a year or so...). I don't think FD rule Steam outright, just at the moment there's no benefit to go there for them. They can still unlock so much with 100% of profit going into their pockets...

Overall they seem to be handling all things well financially, despite initial nervousness of release. They are keep working on their support team and game. I think ED future is secure.
 

starman

starman
There was an extensive interview in this months Edge Magazine where DB actually said that he thought Elite was grindy in the early stages and they wanted to take steps to change that.
 

Titus Balls

Titus Balls
Pecisk said:
Just love speculations without even understanding what half of these numbers means (especially Steam one, no matter how I would love to see ED coming to Steam Machine (and Linux), not happening at least for a year or so...). I don't think FD rule Steam outright, just at the moment there's no benefit to go there for them. They can still unlock so much with 100% of profit going into their pockets...

Overall they seem to be handling all things well financially, despite initial nervousness of release. They are keep working on their support team and game. I think ED future is secure.
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Yes, so far David Braben (as of 26th Septemer 2014) has ruled Steam out: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-09-26-elite-dangerous-the-david-braben-interview

Will you launch the game on Steam?

David Braben: No. We've got to support the game with our own back end anyway, so I don't see the benefit of it.
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Many it's David's mis-understanding of how Steam works? There are plenty of companies with their own backends that support steam (and plenty are indie, let alone the likes of EA with Origin and Ubi Soft with uPlay). For example Planetary Annihilation, or DayZ integrate with it. Some games needs separate logins - hell even Eve Online is on Steam these days.

I think it does show a level of naïvety in the business to what that avenue can give them. Sure, Steam take 30% - but when they've exhausted new sales through their own shop then it's 70% coming from sales they wouldn't have got otherwise (because 100% of nothing is nothing, when it comes to lost sales) - also it adds up new distribution models and platforms.

As someone suggested now wouldn't have been the right time anyway - I don't think this game would have survived a Steam user review mauling.

I think it will be interesting to watch the GDC over the next few days and see what Valve are bringing. If their VR system blows Oculus out the water, but the only way to access it is selling via Steam then Frontier might want to re-consider, considering the media and users are suggesting it's very much a posterchild for VR.
 
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Pibbles

P
Dashing Blade said:
If this genuinely was the legal advise you received, then I would consider taking legal action against your advisors.
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Your post is a general misguided response but especially the above. Why would I consider taking any legal action against any such advisers, when I took no action myself based upon anything stated, and ergo incurred no negative impact due to any such thing. It's a rhetorical statement BTW, as it's quite the opposite and we have now obtained refunds for every person we supported on the list (bar two who we are waiting to hear from with confirmation that FD followed through on their promise).
 
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Dashing Blade

Dashing Blade
Pibbles said:
Your post is a general misguided response . . . .
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Out-of-context quote I'm afraid.

Was merely pointing out that you don't understand the term "price sensitive information" and that therefore your conjectured scenario was . . . something out of la la land.
 
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ffr

Banned
F
Tinman said:
In other words there is nothing new in there that we (and the market) didn't really know before.
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Losses up to £1.9m was new to me. Especially since only last month FD said the losses were £1.5m.

Another new fact is that FD is counting the KS pledges as earned. That's quite a um bold move, since FD hasn't delivered most of the reward tiers, and in fact has confessed it can't deliver the version of the game for which KS backers paid.

bambam_ofc said:
...isn't enough to sustain a GBP 80 million company value, but hey, that doesn't affect players of the game.
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Sure does affect players if the servers go off.
 
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