Part one of Brad McQuaid's Vanguard post-mortem
When most people think of Vanguard, they usually remember that the game had an extremely rocky launch period. A lot of things were changed and fixed after the game was sold to Sony Online Entertainment. The original developer Sigil Games Online (headed by former SOE superstar Brad McQuaid) was also sold in this deal. McQuaid's blog welcome-page mentions that he's been on a break from the games industry since the above events in 2007, but "as of late, he's starting to get that itch again...". It was probably this itch that prompted him to start a multi-part post-mortem of his time with Vanguard at his blog.
McQuaid said that he will be addressing topics in chronological order, and part one deals with what he calls the first big mistake that Sigil made: get everything in writing.
"The first mistake that would have a serious impact later in development was the verbal agreement with Microsoft that Vanguard was to be a first rate, AAA title."
It sounds like a change at Microsoft led to a completely different level of support for Vanguard; less funding, less time, and overall a different outlook on what Vanguard was to become.
"So the moral of the story is one that should have occurred to us: get everything in writing, get it into the contract, because even a company like Microsoft can suddenly undergo significant changes to its management and teams. And when those changes do happen, you might as well be dealing with a new company – anything and everything can change, and change quickly."
Part two of the post-mortem will be dealing with the good and bad aspects of creating an all-star team, and we'll bring it to your attention when it surfaces.
