Pdox cancels East vs. West

[sandman2575]

A shame, although you could see the writing on the wall for a while now:

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?760477-A-joint-statement-from-BL-Logic-and-Paradox-Interactive!

[Nefaro]

 :-[

[steve58]

76 pages of comments already :o  That should give Paradox some indication that there was a lot of interest in this game.

[BanzaiCat]

The devs must have really pissed off Paradox. Missing/delaying deadlines doesn't help, but damn, that sucks.

[Greybriar]

76 pages of comments already :o  That should give Paradox some indication that there was a lot of interest in this game.

My post started the 80th page in the thread....for all the good it will do.

[sandman2575]

The complete cancellation of EvW comes as a bit of a surprise, to me at least.  When they announced the 'open beta' idea not too long ago, it was clearly a "we're trying our best to salvage this sinking project" moment.  But I didn't expect Pdox to put the kibosh on the whole thing -- at least, not so soon after floating the open beta idea.

[Greybriar]

East vs. West had been in development for over a year and a half. Johan first announced it in a thread as Project Reagan on 25 June 2012.

Such a waste of time and resources.

[Bletchley_Geek]

And the second time something similar happens in two years. This thing of the mod-turned-game seems to have not worked well for Paradox, after the two HoI mod-turned-game titles.

[sandman2575]

And the second time something similar happens in two years. This thing of the mod-turned-game seems to have not worked well for Paradox, after the two HoI mod-turned-game titles.

Yeah, wouldn't surprise me if the mod-turned-game concept is now officially mothballed as far as Pdox is concerned.  First MagnaMundi now this.

[GDS_Starfury]

Im still hopeful about Road to Moscow being released.  ???

[Nefaro]

And the second time something similar happens in two years. This thing of the mod-turned-game seems to have not worked well for Paradox, after the two HoI mod-turned-game titles.

Yeah, wouldn't surprise me if the mod-turned-game concept is now officially mothballed as far as Pdox is concerned.  First MagnaMundi now this.

I'm not sure if the older ones that were finished, based on HOI2 and EU2, every sold much either.  By the time some of those were out, the newer EU3 and HOI3 were out or soon to be and people just went for those.

[steve58]

Well, perhaps all is not lost. There is a new Indiegogo project called Project Kennedy, that may be a replacement for East vs West.  They only want $480,000 :-\.  I'll keep an eye on this, but I dunno...

From Bluesnews:

East vs. West Cancelled; Knocked
[Mar 09, 2014, 12:49 pm ET] - 2 Comments

The Paradox Interactive Forums have an announcement from a couple of days ago revealing that development of East vs. West has been cancelled. This planned standalone Hearts of Iron game was originally a modification before becoming a commercial project under the guidance of Paradox. "As the project has been severly [sic] delayed we dont [sic] think that open beta / early acccess [sic] could, within our desired timeline, meet the set criteria," explains Paradox CEO Fredrik Wester. "It has been a journey of ups and downs since we started the development of East Vs West back in May 2011. We wish each other nothing but the best with future endeavors."

In an unusual twist, the Indiegogo campaign for Project Kennedy, a Cold War grand strategy game, throws the Bl-Logic team under the tank over failure to deliver (thanks Joao): "Note: We worked on past Paradox and Bl-Logic games. We are not the complete team from Bl-Logic that worked on East vs. West and eventually FAILED horribly to deliver a final product by 6. March 2014. They had a quarter million euros in budget and 4 years time to develop their title and still blew it. We know these guys, their bad management and we know how buggy their latest version was. This kickstarter here is definitly [sic] independent from them. They did not get it done, but we will. We are professionals, we stick to deadlines, we deliver quality and we know what counts."

I've never used Indiegogo, but this part bothers me.  There are 2 types of funding in Indiegogo: fixed and flexible.

(from FAQs)
What if I don't reach my funding goal?
If your campaign is set up as Flexible Funding, you will be able to keep the funds you raise, even if you don't meet your goal. If your campaign is set up as Fixed Funding, all contributions will be returned to your funders if you do not meet your goal.

Project Kennedy is setup as flexible:

Flexible Funding
This campaign will receive all funds raised even if it does not reach its goal. Funding duration: March 06, 2014 - May 05, 2014 (11:59pm PT).

[Staggerwing]

^Ouch!

[steve58]

...and this also bothers me.  From the Project Kennedy Indiegogo page discussing their options: A) get the full $480,000, or B)

What We Need & What You Get

A reasonable estimation is that we will require around 480.000,- USD for all technology, manpower, licences and development expenses to build a game from scratch.

A more econmoic alternative is Option B, where we will buy 2 development licences to access Europa (HoI2) and Clausewitz (HoI3) engines. We will then salvage parts that are left over from the East vs. West development and integrate what we deem to have worth into our game.

...if they were not part of the East vs West team, how are they going to salvage code from it? ???  Is Paradox/BL-Logic just going to give it to them?   Thinking, I'm going to watch this one from the sidelines....

[Staggerwing]

They said they were not the complete team. They must have access to some of the resources or know that Paradox still does.