News Bethesda announces formation Roundhouse Studios (staffed by team from recently-closed Human Head Studios )

[prudis]

 

[arts&crafts]

Time for Prey 2 - 2

 

[Madventure]

An Update From Human Head Studios - Human Head

The last month has been a unique one for all of us at Human Head Studios. We recently launched Rune II on the Epic Store and we hope that you’re enjoying the game and checking out the Rune II streams. We’re proud of what our talented team has created and encourage everyone to sail their …

www.humanhead.com

Posted this in the other thread but I'll post it here, HHS's response or take on it

 

[gabbo]

If they are able to rework their original prey2 into somethibg else and keep it related to the original game, excellent.

For those hoping HumanHead would be able to turn it's situation around and maybe get Rune2 into decent shape and/or Bethesda original plan of death by a million cut, this is a sad day

edit:apparently support will continue for Rune2 so that's a plus. maybe itll be a good game in 2020

 

[prudis]

edit:apparently support will continue for Rune2 so that's a plus. maybe itll be a good game in 2020

seems like it, but i gguess they were contractually obliged to in a way

 

[sk2k]

EDIT: That damn prudis bot was faster than me.

EDIT 2: So the team that worked on Rune 2 was not aware that the studio will be closed? Hmm.

 

[Ge0force]

"and the game’s demand has exceeded our expectations"

They expected only 20 people to play the game online on the day of release?

Several popular streamers were playing it tho.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Dearie me. Imagine the emotions behind the scenes considering the bad blood between Human Head and Bethesda.

 

[Álvaro de Campos]

Dearie me. Imagine the emotions behind the scenes considering the bad blood between Human Head and Bethesda.

That's what I don't get. HH clearly isn't the studio it used to be considering the quality of games they're putting out, plus Beth should be very annoyed at all the bad press and conspiracy theories of how they purposely didn't pay milestones in order to buy the studio, if that was all true why did HH ultimately sell themselves and why does Beth even still want them?

 

[crimsonheadGCN]

I hope HH's Prey 2 gets reworked into another IP and a sequel to Prey (2017) is in development at Arkane.

Prey (2017) was really awesome and one of the few games that I tried completing most of the side quests.

 

[prudis]

Rune II publisher Ragnarok Game has filed a legal complaint against developer Human Head Studios for withholding game assets.

It’s a rather bizarre turn of events given both companies worked together to release the title, and one that’s complicated by the fact that Human Head Studios is technically no more.

The studio announced its closure less than a month ago, before simultaneously revealing the entire team had been offered the chance to start afresh under the Bethesda Softworks umbrella as new company Roundhouse Studios.

The news caught evidently caught Ragnarok by surprise, with the publisher saying it was "shocked" to hear Human Head was shutting down and effectively joining Bethesda just one day after the launch of Rune II.

"Human Head Studios announced that they closed their doors and will be starting a new studio. This is shocking news to us, as there are several entities working on Rune II -- we found out about this news when you did," wrote the company at the time.

Although Ragnarok pledged to keep supporting Rune II by sticking to the established post-launch roadmap, the company claims it has been unable to make any headway because of Human Head’s refusal to play ball.

The publisher alleges the defunct studio is unwilling to produce the assets and source code it needs to support the title, forcing it to take legal action.

"As mentioned previously, we had no warning that our long term partner and friends in this project would abandon it during its most crucial moment, leaving our team at Ragnarok Game LLC to shoulder both the development and publishing burden of launch all on its own," reads a company statement.

"Since Human Head’s sudden closure, announcement, and discovering the active concealment of their acquisition, we have repeatedly requested access to the final launch build source code and Rune II game assets. This is so we can continue to support, update, and execute future DLC for our community. As part of the publishing agreement on Rune II, Ragnarok Game LLC has paid for the development of these assets and is the rightful owner of them.

"After repeated refusals by Human Head to produce these assets, we’ve had no choice but to file a legal complaint in order to obtain the Rune II game assets. We have exhausted all possible options before getting to this point. This is not the step we wanted to take, but it is necessary in order to fulfill our promises to our community."

lol

 

[Alextended]

I imagine bethesda lawyers gave the greenlight for the whole debacle so it's probably futile or even just for show (maybe they did give it already, or plan to).

 

[prudis]

Rune II source code returned to publisher

The Rune II ruckus may be one step closer to resolution, as publisher Ragnarok Game LLC announced this week that it has…

www.gamesindustry.biz

 

[prudis]

damn the Rune 2 project was a mess under Human head

Studio 369 formed out of Rune 2 launch disaster

In the wake of the unexpected dissolution of original Rune 2 developer Human Head, publisher Ragnarok Games LLC has cre…

www.gamesindustry.biz

In January, Ragnarok revealed it had received a hard drive with Rune 2 source code and assets on it. But Candler says Ragnarok still didn't have a full version history of the project and "was missing some crucial build configurations that had to be re-engineered."

He enlisted developers he'd had previous experience working with -- including Studio 369 CTO Dan Nikolaides -- to help reconstruct a build they could work off of, and they quickly put together a quality-of-life patch for the game.

Then we started digging in and said, 'Well what do we want to fix?' We wanted to fix combat, AI, how enemies spawn, the loot system... We basically wanted to fix all the game systems where we said, 'This is not fun,'" Candler says. "We took out a lot of the survival elements like hunger and freezing that were just annoying."

.....
"Our obligation is to deliver a fun product for the fans that people enjoy and say they got their money's worth and had fun," he says. "The biggest difference that I have now with my new team versus Human Head is that whenever we come up with an idea or a question the answer is, 'Yes we can do that.'

"It was a just a surreal experience of working with [Human Head] and saying, 'This is your IP. You should do everything you can to make it as great as possible.' And yet every time we asked them to do something to improve the gameplay, the answer was very much a no."

Candler concedes those negative answers were more common toward the end of the project, and that is "kind of normal" as it becomes time to ship a game. However, he said that throughout the development process on Rune 2, "there was always a failure to execute."

The game was effectively dead on arrival at launch, he says, but Ragnarok and Studio 369 have salvaged something from that disaster.

The next big changes on the list are rewriting the game's entire story and re-recording voiceovers, as well as adding a multiplayer mode for up to 30 players.

 

[gabbo]

damn the Rune 2 project was a mess under Human head

Studio 369 formed out of Rune 2 launch disaster

In the wake of the unexpected dissolution of original Rune 2 developer Human Head, publisher Ragnarok Games LLC has cre…

www.gamesindustry.biz

This reads like HumanHead knew, even when the were first announcing the game to the public, that they were going to jump ship and leave Rune2 a dumpster fire. A dumpster fire for a publisher they themselves had a hand in creating (if im not mistaken, Ragnarok LLC was formed by HumanHead and an outside partner).

The animosity might be ridiculous between the the HH leads who left for Bethesda and the guys at Ragnarock. \Hopefully one day we can get the Viking game that was originally proposed, whether it be this one completely reworked or a whole new game by someone else.