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Former Silicon Knights dev sentenced in child pornography case
Former Precursor Games and Silicon Knights designer Ken McCulloch was sentenced this week in an Ontario Court of Justice in St. Catharines, Canada on child pornography charges. Judge Joseph Nadel sentenced McCulloch to 12 months of time served; McCulloch has been jailed since his arrest in late June 2013, after he pleaded guilty to making child pornography available. According to The Welland Tribune, Niagara Regional Police also charged McCulloch with sexual assault, forcible confinement and sexual interference during his time in jail in the past year. McCulloch will remain in custody, returning to court on August 26 to answer to those charges. As a result of the initial sentencing, McCulloch will be added to the provincial sex offender registry for the next 20 years. Judge Nadel also ordered McCulloch to stay away from any child under the age of 16 and from schools, parks, recreation centers and public pools for 10 years.
Precursor isn't giving up on Shadow of the Eternals
In a post thanking backers, Shadow of the Eternals developer Precursor Games says it has not given up on the project after failing to meet its Kickstarter campaign goal. "It is unfortunate that we were unable to crowd-fund this project at this time, but we have not given up. We intend to pursue other avenues with the ultimate goal of having our games come to fruition," reads the latest update on the Kickstarter page. After closing its original crowdfunding effort to better describe its vision and restructure its funding goals, Precursor relaunched the campaign for Shadow of the Eternals on July 25. The developer's second attempt at funding ultimately fell well short of its $750,000 goal, inching just above the $320K mark before ending on August 23. Billed as a spiritual successor to the GameCube-exclusive Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, Shadow of the Eternals will continue its online presence with what the latest campaign update describes as upgraded forum software. The game's forums will remain open, the developer promises. Meanwhile, Shadow of the Eternals is still up for votes on Steam Greenlight. Joystiq has contacted Precursor to find out whether it will be removed from Valve's platform for the time being.
Shadow of the Eternals fails to reach funding goal
The second Kickstarter campaign for a spiritual successor to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem has failed. Shadow of the Eternals from Precursor Games was seeking $750,000 in funds through Kickstarter, but ran out of time before reaching $400,000. Precursor Games pulled the plug on its own campaign the first time around, due to what Denis Dyack called "noise" surrounding his involvement in the project. Dyack also admitted there were misconceptions of what Precursor promised, due to unclear messaging in the first pledge drive. Precursor Games relaunched on Kickstarter late last month. Shadow of the Eternals was planned for Wii U, PS4 and PC on Steam. A Steam Greenlight campaign has been fighting for votes since May, though with a lack of funding for the game we may see it ultimately canceled as well.
Shadow of the Eternals Kickstarter campaign resurrected
Denis Dyack and his group at Precursor Games has relaunched their Kickstarter campaign for Shadow of the Eternals, the CryEngine 3-powered spiritual successor to GameCube horror game Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. Shadow of the Eternals is looking to secure $750,000 in funding, half of the requested $1.5 million from the first go around. Reward tiers are restructured and so is the campaign: Shadow of the Eternals will span thousands of years and highlight numerous characters like Detective Paul Becker, voiced by David Hayter. Becker, investigating a massacre at an asylum, discovers two survivors who seemingly want to kill each other – one a prim Wall Street type, the other a tattooed biker archetype. Precursor is still aiming to launch on PC and Wii U, and a Steam Greenlight drive is currently seeking votes from the community. After pulling the plug on the Kickstarter campaign last month, Precursor Games' Denis Dyack told Joystiq there was a lot of "noise" surrounding Shadow of the Eternals due to misconceptions of what Precursor Games was promising. This new Kickstarter campaign aims to be more inclusive to the community, with a special area of the Precursor forums dedicated to fan input, unlocked at the lowest backer tier.
Shadow of the Eternals returns to Kickstarter on July 25
On July 25, Precursor Games will re-launch its Kickstarter campaign for Shadow of the Eternals, which it considers a spiritual successor to Silicon Knights' cult classic, Eternal Darkness. Last month, Precursor Games sought $1.5 million through the crowd-funding service for Shadow of the Eternals, but pulled the plug before the drive could be concluded. Former Silicon Knights head Denis Dyack told Joystiq that drama surrounding his involvement had affected perceptions of the game negatively. At the end of June, Precursor Games' writer, game designer and artist Ken McCulloch was arrested on charges of distribution and possession of child pornography. Precursor Games was quick to distance itself from McCulloch and assured he is no longer affiliated with Precursor Games in any way following the allegations.
Precursor Games distancing itself from co-founder following child pornography arrest
Precursor Games writer, game designer and artist Ken McCulloch has been arrested by Niagara Regional Police on child pornography possession and distribution charges, Bullet News Niagara reports. Police confiscated a "significant" amount of computer hardware after exercising a search warrant on a home in St. Catharines yesterday. "Having just learned of these disturbing charges today and based on the serious nature of them, Ken McCulloch is no longer affiliated in any way with Precursor Games," CEO Paul Caporicci said in a statement on the developer's official forums. McCulloch's employee profile has been removed the site, and now directs to a 404 error. McCulloch is currently in custody while he awaits a bail hearing, Bullet News Niagara reports. Precursor Games, an independent developer formed from ex-Silicon Knights employees, is generally known for its controversial, unorthodox (and temporarily cancelled) attempts at crowdfunding Shadows of the Eternals, a spiritual successor to Denis Dyack's cult Gamecube classic Eternal Darkness. We've reached out to Precursor Games for comment. [Thanks, Drake.]
Precursor on Shadow of the Eternals and its failure to connect
Precursor Games Chief Creative Officer Denis Dyack tells Joystiq that the "noise" surrounding his involvement in Shadow of the Eternals added to an already unclear message in the company's crowdfunding campaigns. Earlier this month, the crowdfunding drives on the Precursor website and via Kickstarter were canceled by the studio, which promised to rework and relaunch the project at a later date. "I think that noise was due in large part to misconception," Dyack says, who notes that the campaigns failed to detail what Shadow of the Eternals could be, were it to reach its funding goal. Dyack, who had previously been the leader at Silicon Knights before resigning from his position a year ago, adds that the cacophony surrounding his involvement linked Precursor and Shadow of the Eternals to his previous studio, which he promptly points out as inaccurate promising the companies "have nothing to do with each other." In May, Precursor Games CEO Paul Caporicci told Wired his company had purchased assets originally crafted at Silicon Knights for its first project. While reports have suggested parts of an Eternal Darkness successor – which, spiritually, Shadow of the Eternals is – were built at Silicon Knights using investments made by other companies for unrelated projects, Dyack has denied the claims. "We're working on getting over that," Dyack says to the continued discussion surrounding his role at Precursor, "I don't know what else to say. When Precursor was all set up, this was something I wanted too." Dyack's focus is in creative, in a role that does not put him in charge of business decisions. "I guess it's safe to say there's always been noise around me and I think that what I'm working on now is to make people understand the games that we're making."
Shadows of the Eternals crowdfunding drives to be canceled this week
Precursor Games, the development studio of ex-SIlicon Knights employees that has been attempting to fund a spiritual successor to Eternal Darkness dubbed Shadow of the Eternals, will cancel both its Kickstarter campaign and its self-powered crowdfunding campaign through PayPal this Thursday, June 6. Precursor plans to re-launch the Kickstarter campaign in "just a few short weeks," at which point "exciting new developments" will be revealed. "Since we announced this Kickstarter campaign we have seen more support from our community than we had ever hoped for," the announcement reads. "Along with this support has come a host of a new exciting opportunities that will make the game better than we envisioned. As a result, we have chosen to temporarily take down the Shadow of the Eternals crowdfunding campaigns on both Kickstarter and our own website on Thursday, June 6." Due to Kickstarter's architecture, no one that donated to the fundraising drive will be charged for their contributions. Likewise, the studio says that anyone who donated via the official Shadow of the Eternals website will receive a full refund through PayPal. As of press time, the still-active Kickstarter campaign has raised $127,364 of its $1.35 million goal. Meanwhile, donations through the game's official site have totalled at $157,545, for a combined $284,959.
Shadow of the Eternals Kickstarter struggling, donations to be refunded should campaign fail
Eighteen days away from the end of its alloted lifespan, Precursor Games' Kickstarter fundraiser for Shadow of the Eternals has raised $117,484 of its $1.35 million dollar goal. Add that to the $157,415 Precursor has raised on its own website, and the entire movement has amassed $273,944 since this whole deal started back on May 6. At its current rate, the Kickstarter campaign will top out at around $234,000, according to Kicktraq's analysis as of press time. "If the project does not reach its goal on Kickstarter, we will refund all pledges made through PayPal on our own site," Precursor COO Shawn Jackson said during a recent Reddit AMA. He also said, should the fundraising campaign fail, continued work on the game will be "unlikely," as Precursor does "not have any other source of funding." "We will entertain all options to make this game a reality because we believe in this project," Jackson said. "However, we can't be sure a publisher will share our vision for interacting with the community during development, or this would work in the traditional model."
Denis Dyack speaks up on X-Men: Destiny mismanagement allegations
It may not be the timeliest response, but Denis Dyack is speaking out against allegations that the very poorly received X-Men: Destiny was the result of catastrophic mismanagement on the part of developer Silicon Knights. Dyack recently left his role as the head of Silicon Knights to join Precursor games, developer of the coming Eternal Darkness spiritual successor, Shadow of the Eternals. As Precursor is seeking crowdfunding for the project, and Dyack is serving as its chief creative officer, it seems the company believes he has some 'splaining to do. The allegations sprung from a Kotaku article penned by freelance writer Andrew McMillen last October. In a 30-minute YouTube response, Dyack categorically denies statements made in the article, saying that "there isn't any hard evidence whatsoever besides non-credible anonymous sources." Dyack added that Silicon Knights refused to submit any comments for the article in question, as it would have appeared to lend credence to what he sees as untrue allegations. Dyack then reads a letter he alleges was written by McMillen to an anonymous source. The letter states that McMillen's article was initially refused by Wired games editor Chris Kohler, who cited a lack of facts and documentation, apart from the comments from anonymous ex-employees. Dyack goes on to say that "not only did Silicon Knights not divert funds from X-Men: Destiny to our other projects, which I can't talk about, we actually put more money into X-Men: Destiny than what we were paid." Dyack says he and Silicon Knights worked with Activision and Marvel to make Destiny as good as it could be and, while he's sorry for how it turned out, he says, "We put nothing but our best efforts" into the game. Dyack also admitted to saying some things he "shouldn't have said in the press" regarding X-Men Destiny, adding, "I've learned my lesson." The same mistakes won't be made again, he says. The video goes on to address other concerns, such as Silicon Knights' relationship with Nintendo, and Dyack has also posted a litany of related references on Precursor's forums.
Shadow of the Eternals gets a secondary Kickstarter campaign
Precursor Games has launched a second, simultaneous crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter for Shadow of the Eternals, the episodic horror game serving as a spiritual successor to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. This is a supplement to the crowdfunding project that Precursor launched on its own site on May 6. The Kickstarter campaign looks to raise $1.35 million, while Precursor's campaign asks for $1.5 million. "Due to overwhelming popular demand, we are happy to announce that an official Kickstarter campaign has launched for Shadow of the Eternals," Precursor says. "This gives potential pledgers even more options to contribute to the game." Precursor's campaign accepts payments through PayPal – unlike Kickstarter – and doesn't necessarily have to reach its goal to take whatever money it raises. That campaign has 24 days remaining and has raised $156,000. The Kickstarter campaign has 36 days to reach its goal, otherwise Precursor won't receive any of that money. Precursor will use the money raised in its crowdfunding efforts to launch a pilot episode in Q3 2014, and pay for the engine and core system development. Future episodes of Shadow of the Eternals – there will be 12 in total – will be "significantly cheaper and faster to produce," and Precursor will announce more episodes based on the success of its fundraising(s).
Nine minutes of Shadow of the Eternals gameplay revealed
Precursor Games has released nine minutes of gameplay footage from its CryEngine 3-powered horror-adventure game Shadow of the Eternals, giving a very thorough look at an early work-in-progress scene. Pitched as a spiritual successor to Silicon Knights' GameCube cult hit Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, Precursor's Shadow of the Eternals seeks backer support in an ongoing crowd-funding campaign. Backers have pledged over $134,000 toward Precursor's goal of $1.5 million, with 27 days left in the studio's funding campaign. Developer Precursor Games purchased game assets and hardware from the now semi-defunct Silicon Knights, and several former SK staffers, including Eternal Darkness director Denis Dyack, have joined Precursor's team for the project.
Report: Silicon Knights closes office, unloads assets
Something shady is going on in the province of Ontario with Silicon Knights and the full story is still shaking out. Yesterday it was reported that Precursor Games, which is working on the curiously funded Shadow of the Eternals – a "spiritual successor" to Silicon Knights' Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem – bought and implemented Silicon Knights' assets into their new project. Polygon also reported late yesterday that Silicon Knights' offices are now empty (stopping just short of closing), and that despite there being "no connection to Silicon Knights" according to Precursor Games' CEO Paul Caporicci, former SK head Dennis Dyack confirmed that he had left SK and was now chief creative officer at Precursor. Polygon has way, way more on this. Silicon Knights lost a multi-million, multi-year lawsuit against Epic Games last year and there's still questions about the money the company may or may not have gotten from the Ontario government. More on this is sure to be revealed in its time.
Shadow of the Eternals uses assets purchased from Silicon Knights
A bit of that old Silicon Knights black magic lives on in Shadow of the Eternals, the "spiritual successor" to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem from Precursor Games. Art assets originally created by Silicon Knights employees have been bought, paid for and implemented into this new project. "We did purchase some art assets from Silicon Knights," Precursor Games CEO Paul Caporicci told Wired. "We were very happy to be able to put those assets created by the talented past employees to use." It was reported last October that as much as 40 percent of Silicon Knights had been working on a sequel to Eternal Darkness, which may explain the existence of said art assets. Shadow of the Eternals is being built in CryEngine 3, Caporicci added – an important distinction to make considering the major issues Silicon Knights suffered after using Unreal Engine 3 and subsequently employing its own game engine. Though Nintendo owns the rights to Eternal Darkness and has patented the game's sanity mechanics, Caporicci said similar gameplay ideas can be safely implemented without breaking the law.
PSA: Shadow of the Eternals funding drive is live, has its own rules
The crowd-funding campaign for Shadow of the Eternals, a spiritual successor to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, is live now directly through developer Precursor Games. Borrowing the format from Kickstarter, Precursor has given itself 30 days to raise $1.5 million, with rewards for specific pledge amounts. Shadow of the Eternals will be distributed in 12 episodes whose story spans 2,500 years of psychological horror across Egypt, England, Hungary and the US. The pilot episode takes place in Hungary in 1610, at the castle of Erzebet Bathory, who is regarded as the most prolific female serial killer in history. She was also a countess. The Blood Countess. The pilot is scheduled to hit PC and Wii U in Q3 2014, and the entire project has Eternal Darkness director Denis Dyack as Precursor's chief creative officer. Precursor is based in Canada, meaning Kickstarter is out of the question and so are its rules – Shadow of the Eternals has a "flexible" funding goal. Even if it doesn't reach the full $1.5 million, Precursor will keep whatever money it raises, as long as there is enough to complete the game. "All contributions will go directly toward the development of this game and making it a reality," the FAQ reads. "We are committed to making this game, however, if it becomes apparent that we cannot raise enough to develop this project then we will refund all pledges."
Eternal Darkness spiritual successor 'Shadow of the Eternals' announced, crowdfunding begins Monday [Update: PC/Wii U, story details]
Update: Precursor Games will seek $1.5 million in funding when its campaign begins on Monday, a representative of the studio has told IGN. Additionally, Shadow of the Eternals will be released as 12 episodes for PC and Wii U, though an expected release window was not given. Initial story details describe Detective Paul Becker as a Louisiana cop embroiled in a conflict between two warring cults. The game will "span over 2500 years of history throughout Egypt, England, Hungary, and the United States" while players "try to balance the mechanics of combat, magick, and sanity events." Original text: Shadow of the Eternals was announced earlier today in a trailer on IGN with wording that heavily implies the game is a spiritual successor to the 2002 Gamecube cult classic Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. Under development at Precursor Games, Shadow of the Eternals will be multiplatform, presuming the success of a crowdfunding drive that is set to begin on Monday. Whether that crowdfunding initiative takes the shape of a Kickstarter, Indiegogo or independent campaign remains to be seen. What is known, however, is that Eternal Darkness director and producer Denis Dyack is involved in the project to some degree. On a more cryptic note, the Latin phrase at the beginning of the trailer translates to "The Order of the Unseen," which jives with the trailer's request for the viewer to "join the order." Personally, we're going to need to see some kind of incentive before we sign anything. Do we get a free toaster? Are utilities included? Let's make a deal here. [Thanks, Tom!]
