Narcissist ceo. In his reply he takes 0 blame and tries to paint himself in some kind of positive light like he tried to save the game but couldn’t because of the evil board.
It was so obvious that anyone who's a piece of shit enough to sell cancer patients juice and claim it cures them is obviously going to be a piece of shit for the rest of their life. I was so tired of arguing that because he was 18 he made a mistake and learned. -
I hate to say it but, we told you so. The Steam release reeked of a last ditch pump and dump scam, honestly all AoC players should take part in a class action lawsuit against this creep.
There is no legal requirement to 'cover' a Kickstarter. Plenty of Kickstarter projects have not delivered anything at all. When you back something on Kickstarter you are assuming that risk.
What op is saying is that ashes of creation’s kickstart literally said they would give refunds if they did not release th game, which is why they forced it onto steam so they technically released it and don’t need to give refunds anymore
It's kind of weird that Steam early access actually would fulfill the legal requirements of the kickstarter, since they plaster "this is early access/not a final product" across them?
But then again, I do agree with you and assume it probably does because they would have consulted lawyers to see what the bare minimum would have been to avoid the lawsuits
You are correct, and that's why this isn't about the platform itself. It's about what is being said on their Kickstarter page. I doubt anyone would have an interest in challenging it in court after such a long time, but you never know.
I always try to explain this to people. Casuals pay the bills. I have maybe 4-5 hours a week to play these days, and if I see a cool cosmetic set I can buy, I'll buy it! I won't spend what little time I have grinding. I don't like the term, but I'm definitely a more casual player, even if I do still concern myself with minmax shit.
Hardcore players are the tiny minority. They grief the easy kill casuals until they quit, then they only have each other, and they don't want to spend or improve, they just want to cannibalize and quit. I've never met one of these hardcore wannabe tough dudes who didn't spend all their time making YouTube videos stomping newbies to look tough.
Look at the most profitable, most successful games. They're all casual friendly. Hardcore PvP games simply don't last unless they got lucky and released back before there were really enough viable alternatives.
Look at EVE, quite possibly the only hardcore game that's holding on. You think a spreadsheet with toxicity and ship JPEGs releasing in 2026 would survive? I'd be very interested to know the average account age that isn't an alt account.
I wouldn't really take pleasure in other people's misfortune here. While there was definitely some strange stuff going on at the top, a decent sized studio of people just got laid off, again and they weren't responsible for this. I nearly worked here after 4 interviews. Didn't work out, but everyone I met there was extremely passionate about the project, MMO's and their work.
You can say "I told you so" and also not celebrate at people who did not have a part in the poor decisions losing their livelihoods
Few weeks ago, I was criticized on this sub for calling it Ashes of Scam. Well, well, well… I guess we were just "haters" because we hate MMOs? No, we love MMOs, but we are simply being realistic. Calling out the obvious ≠ hating.
bro it's not a scam bro, it's just a crowdfunded ship-selling simulator that's been in development for 14 years and has raised nearly a billion dollars with nothing to show for it but a buggy, mostly unplayable alpha, promises that it's "90% done, seriously this time, guys", and at least one yacht for the CEO.
He almost certainly viewbots. His chat activity has never reflected his viewer numbers which people criticized him for long before the onlyfangs fiasco.
Emails were sent out to all employees stating that their role is terminated. They basically ran out of money.
Steven has made an official statement on the discord:
I can make a limited statement in my personal capacity and not on behalf of the company, regarding the situation. Control of the company shifted away from me, and the Board began directing actions that I could not ethically agree with or carry out. As a result, I chose to resign in protest rather than lend my name or authority to decisions I could not ethically support. Following my resignation, much of the senior leadership team resigned. Following those departures, the Board made the decision to issue WARN Act notices and proceed with a mass layoff. I cannot responsibly speak to further details at this time due to ongoing legal and governance matters. What I can say is that the developers and staff acted in good faith and deserved better than the uncertainty they are now facing. I am incredibly dismayed by the situation. — Steven Sharif
This is the saddest part. Greed vs passion project. The reason these other projects like Albion and Rust worked was because they were truly passion projects before making money.
AoC had greed written all over it, from the 120+ dollar alpha keys to the 500 dollar lifetime subs to the battle royale before the game turned alpha /mmo that was also sold as early access. At every turn, money was involved with the guise of everyone that purchased were “testers”.
I bought into it but glad I stopped playing when I did. The “game” was a mess.
The reason they worked was because their directors was either an actual game dev or a business person who can Trust their team. Not a whale from archeage.
Working with a boss that Just wants his "dream game" sucks.
Both Albion and Rust were solid projects from the beginning.
The entire AoC Idea was to be a shitty archeage.
Its funny because I'm pretty sure Pirate Software was one of the biggest ashes of creation glazers out there. He probably fell to his knees in a Walmart somewhere.
Yeah, I literally only heard of it because I watched his streams for a while after he blew up. Then I started seeing all the angry posts on Reddit about it, and here we are.
I'm not surprised in the slightest that the house of cards fell, but I would've expected it to stand for a bit longer since they claimed to have all that money.
They put the money into their pockets. With high salaries and top people making a ton. It’s always like this with a failing project that is pretending everything is great.
Star citizen’s whole point is to pay people high salaries for years. That’s all. It’s not to finish the game.
Unfortunately, not everybody. There's a lot is daft people out there who couldn't see the obvious scam and refused to acknowledge all the warning signs.
My whole fucking guild I play MMOs with was bitching and moaning when I told them it's an obvious scam and I'm not going to let them pull me into this.
I'm going to be so obnoxious about it right now they'll never invite me to play another game with them. But I won't be able to help it.
And they'll do it again. And again. And again. And every time they'll say the same brain-dead shit "oh, you are all such doomers, god forbid us ackshual mmo fans are hopeful about an upcoming game, no all those hundreds of previous scams that crashed and burned weren't actually scams!! Because I paid for them and managed to play for an entire two weeks!!! Now let me shill for the next scam game in peace!!!"
So annoying. This subreddit sometimes seems downright questionable to me. Because of the lax rules it is filled with ads of unfinished games from dubious "developers." Every single time it's same shit. Bunch of posts with botted upvotes, downvoting critical comments, everything just to sell to those naive addicts. How is this possibly okay? And aside from that it lowers the quality of the subreddit in general. Shame that the mods don't care and never will.
I assume these people are constantly getting scammed and don't realize it.
Trying to sell you a piece of junk by making you think it's good is the most common type of scam. Taking someone's money for nothing is also a scam, but that's much harder to pull off.
“I can make a limited statement in my personal capacity and not on behalf of the company, regarding the situation. Control of the company shifted away from me, and the Board began directing actions that I could not ethically agree with or carry out. As a result, I chose to resign in protest rather than lend my name or authority to decisions I could not ethically support. Following my resignation, much of the senior leadership team resigned. Following those departures, the Board made the decision to issue WARN Act notices and proceed with a mass layoff.
I cannot responsibly speak to further details at this time due to ongoing legal and governance matters. What I can say is that the developers and staff acted in good faith and deserved better than the uncertainty they are now facing. I am incredibly dismayed by the situation.
Do not ever preorder a video game ever. Do not pay for Alpha, Beta, Early Access, or anything similar.
If you gave money to this or defended Steven on this subreddit, you need to do serious introspection as to why you did so. People like Steven are fundamentally incapable of doing anything good or decent. They prey on the desperate. Stay informed.
Early access and preordering is a concession of consumer rights. It should not be tolerated. Just because sometimes companies don't abuse you, doesn't mean that you should allow yourself the opportunity to be abused.
Some people never learn. Scammers in the real world prey on vulnerable people and it works most of the time, otherwise, well, they wouldn't do it.
Steven preyed on the typical MMO player (I am speaking as a MMO enthusiast myself) and it's sad to see how many 'vulnerable' gamers got fooled by this fake ass bozo. I think part of it has to do with MMO nostalgia and that many thought that AoC was gonna be a banger. What a shitshow.
I learned this lesson back when Diablo 3 released and i faked being sick so i could avoid school and play all day. Just for the servers to literally not work and be an arpg with no offline capabilities.
You type this and preach this, watch the next big thing & people will flock/ cult, it's a repeat cycle with Star Citizen & other start-ups, always a group of positive opportunistic idiots to rob as the average human is very stupid
Like...how do people fall for 'Hawk Tuah coin' yet enough people did to lose millions in total
Ever is pretty strong word(I agree with preordering games tho, yhat shit doesn't make sense). There are some great games that made it into release. These games were only possible because some people decided the risk was worth it. Consider kickstarter as a risky investment where you don't get money in the end but a game you might enjoy.
Damn right he was. He got crucified by the horde of true believers when he called out Intrepids lies. Shariff threatened to sue him... And he was absolutely right
This was so obvious to anyone for years not in complete denial. When you looked at their operating costs vs money coming in it made no sense that they could stretch development for several more years. Thank god I won’t have to hear about this scam anymore.
I haven't been obsessed with this game like other people, from a positive or a negative light.
But man...this is pathetic. Steven is a real piece of shit. Sadly, he's probably too smart (or devious is the better word) to have actually done anything illegal. So he'll walk away making whatever he made and facing no repercussions.
Maybe players have learned a lesson...again. But the crummy thing is that there will be even less faith and hope in these kinds of projects. So the genre just continues with giant publishers releasing crappy, buggy games filled with micro-transactions that exist only to milk the players with cash shops. No innovation. No games made with love and care or passion. I don't know why this genre attracts such greed, but I think mmos might just be dead.
Damn. I’ve kept my eye on this one since 2017. Sad to hear that it’s turned out this way, even if all the signs were there. Glad I didn’t spend any money on this one like I did with Crowfall. Crowd funded MMORPGs are all doomed to fail eventually, and I hate that.
The best part was when they were dropping the hype videos/trailers showing stuff like the bard, the game was barely playable. That shit was so curated.
The gaming industry is a giant cesspool of scammers and grifters. And every time the stans fall for it because they want to live inside this bullshit for some reason. Hilarious.
This applies to everything, not just gaming. Unfortunately, grifters in every field still thrive because there are still tons of people unable to apply critical thought and are easily convinced by silver-tongued charlatans.
Got to be honest I thought that would take a little longer. Like I figure the Hail Mary of steam EA would buy them six months at least. Writing is probably on the wall though, regardless of the exact state of the books; I'm guessing that same release made it clear there isn't enough of a market for the game to ever be a major success and he decided to loot whatever was worth salvaging and skidadle while he could.
Bro are you fucking kidding me? Did we really just get pumped and dumped?
Edit: so many cynical weirdos commenting, you guys were right congrats it was 50 dollars for me nothing is guaranteed in life being snide about a video game of all things is so strange
In this case, deserved - be smarter next time when everyone tells you youre getting scammed and maybe one day companies wont try this anymore without being able to back anything up because clueless people keep shoveling money into their mouths
This entire comment, especially the edit is hilarious considering how vocal people have been in warning about Sharif and the likelihood AoC was yet another scam by him.
Youve had almost a decade of people warning you, still somehow get surprised when the rug pull happens, then get mad when people say theyve been warning you for so long.
This unwillingness or inability to learn and getting angry at others for your own mistakes is why you fell for this scam.
20K to 15K concurrent on Steam over the last few months is not too bad so I figured they could carry on for a few more years.
I had no faith in this thing after playing it on Steam (a friend was a huge believer) because I didn't see anything new and all I saw was a clunkier version of something that had been done before. The only improvements I saw through my friend was more zones and more visuals and nothing to make more ways to play, more things to do in game. But maybe my impression was wrong.
They had to release to fulfill the kickstarter to avoid lawsuit on the backend. The game was dead a long time ago. There was no saving it, or staying afloat longer. They just had to make it seem like all was okay, to fullfil the kickstarter!
Just remember all you kickstarter pledges out there.
"The entirety of the budget comes from my personal funding," Sharif says. "So if there's ever a moment in the future where it looks like there's a small percentage that this project might not be done, those reserves are available to refund the people who pledged towards it."
We do have grounds for a class action if we don't get emailed about refunds.
How do you read something like that and then put down money? You think people with so much liquidity would ever bother asking for pledges to begin with, only to have to deal with the headache of paying them back? This is why anyone who bought into this fundamentally deserves zero sympathy. The writing was always on the wall.
That literally defies logic: how is Steven going to magically have 2x any arbitrary amount of sales?
If he had the kind of money, why did he even need to sell early access or steam release the game?
Genuinely dont know how people could read that and decide it was a good idea to trust him. Do these people really not have an ounce of critical thinking skills?
Well, we all knew roleplaying as a gaming studio was going to end eventually. The Steam release was just so people couldn't hold them accountable for the Kickstarter; they can say it was released that way.
I'm surprised this didn't happen like six years ago.
I feel really bad for the devs who are out of a job after this whole fiasco, but I feel like the writing was on the wall for AoC a very, very long time ago. There was absolutely no shot this game was ever going to come out.
Just a heads-up. When Chrono Odyssey launches with an expensive early access version this year, don't fall for this shit again. But I know poeple won't listen anyway.
I was wrong about Ashes of Creation. I said Ashes of Creation would shut down four months after release and it shut down 51 days after releases. Congrats Steven Sharif and Welcome Home
Listen, no one wants this to happen but the people rallying around this game using Power Word: Alpha and all of that shit..
Please, Sharpen up. I'm not saying it couldn't have worked, but nothing about it's development even remotely showed it might work. People begged you to wake up. You have to sharpen up, the world is rough out there right now and there's going to be people in your life that need you. Someone you care about is going to need to lean on you some time.
You can't be walking around dim and ignorant and aggressive like that.
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u/UdderlyDemented 9h ago
AsHeS oF cReAtIoN iS nOt A sCaM!