Greed Monger ran off pre-made platform
Last week on Destructoid we reported on the colossal failure that was Greed Monger. Cancelled after three years of development and $100,000 raised via crowdfunding, those who pledged to the game would no longer be receiving the MMO after a long, drawn out and drama-ridden development process. This was naturally a bummer for those involved.
Fortunately, the developers of The Legend of Kilgore and Utherous have stood up and offered anyone who pledged to the game one of 100 copies of their games as consolation.
Those who wish to claim their copies of the games can do so by posting their Greed Monger forum username and profile link on Kilgore’s forums and on Utherous‘ forums, while also posting in the Greed Monger thread announcing the cancellation of the game. A slightly convoluted system, but as the Legend of Kilgore and Utherous developers have no official connection to Greed Monger, this is the only way it could be done.
The games are incredibly similar to what Greed Monger aimed to be – an MMO based on crafting – and according to Kilgore developer Alan Spurlock, that is no coincidence.
The Legend of Kilgore and Greed Monger both utilise a pre-made Unity platform by the name of Atavism. It lays the foundations for developers to make MMOs in Unity, with features such as account management, trading, and chat channels included in the platform. In Spurlock’s own words:
Greed Monger uses a framework called Atavism Online. It’s made for Unity. It’s a “near” full-fledged MMORPG framework. And believe me… it does it all. But don’t expect much to come from it. You still have to be able to program, design, and most of all, know how to use unity lol.
Considering the foundations for an MMO are already in place due to Atavism, Greed Monger’s failure despite raising $100,000 and using Atavism has caused some controversy amongst fellow developers. Spurlock explains:
[Greed Monger] has never needed money. Neither do I. No one that uses Atavism does. The core of the programming is already being done.
Further controversy behind the game can be found on the Atavism forums’ thread for Greed Monger, beginning at the bottom of page seven and continuing through to the end.
According the developers of the game, none of the $90,000 raised through Kickstarter changed hands when the development of the game moved from the creator of the campaign to the new team that eventually canned the project:
Jason did NOT sell GM to us. He gave it to us. No money exchanged hands in this deal.
As for the KS Money we are backtracking through all the money spent over the last 3 years. So far based on Server costs, what team members were paid, the amount spent on assets, License, ect. We have been able to account for $21.5k out of the $100,000+
If the backers were to file a lawsuit it would be against Jason not us. We made sure there was a section in the documents we signed that made it so that Jason was responsible for everything in the past including the KS Funding… We are responsible for whatever happens in the future from the time GM was signed over to us.
Something happened with Greed Monger. The game raised $100,000 and used a premade Unity asset base, was then handed off to an unfunded team and wound up cancelled. Thankfully, at least some developers are trying to make this entire shitty situation right by offering their own games, despite not being related to the development of Greed Monger.
What a clusterfuck of a situation.
