Is there anything left?

[Valin Halcyon]

it feels so empty here now. Many of the forums haven't been posted to in half a year or more. It feels like even the community's work in extending Descent's life, and the experience, is over.

I suppose we know what it feels like to belong to a WWII Veteran's club now. The war is long over, buddies vanishing as time wears on, and Armchair Generals say we did it the wrong way 40 years before they were born.

Looking back to Descent IV (ODS Inc.), our own storyline feels somewhat forced. Robots. Infected by the virus. AGAIN. So I stopped to think for awhile...what is Descent, really, at it's core?

Well, first Descent is 6DoF. Second, it's a 1 man spaceship. Then it's a set of guns and missiles. Then we mix in robots, not humans, for normal play.

And finally, Descent is an old model game design that can no longer commercially succeed in the modern PC gaming market.

Why? It's designed to be sold in a box in a store for $45-55 and taken home to be installed and played singleplayer for awhile and maybe some LAN or Internet games. You have to remember, out of everyone in the world who bought Descent, we who played online are the extreme minority.

These days, games have to be one of two kinds to succeed on the PC without being excessively pirated and sending their developers to the poorhouse.

1. Boxed game for little or no cost that can also be downloaded for free and is supported by in-game advertising or microtransactions. Also the game is continually improved with additional content and activities from the developer.

2. Boxed game for little or no cost that can also be downloaded for free and is an MMORPG, and thus unable to function without the developer's game server. This type is also continually developed over time and is supported by subscriptions or in-game advertising AND microtransactions.

How then can Descent fit either of these business models? I don't know. I haven't spent much time thinking about it yet, but maybe something can come about.

For the record, I work now for CCP Games in Iceland. We're the developers behind EVE Online and the upcoming World of Darkness MMO.


...and there are more than a few old Descent fans here.

[Grendel]

...and there are more than a few old Descent fans here.

More play, less talk

You don't happen to have access to the D3 source code ?

[Krom]

Boxed single player games still have plenty of space in the market, although quite often you can also buy them without the box or the disk using internet distribution services such as Steam and the like.

[Valin Halcyon]

No, No D3 source. Why would you think we did?

Krom: ...or thepiratebay.org *cough*

[Krom]

http://www.dailytech.com/The+Pirate+Bay ... e15562.htm

[Valin Halcyon]

tpb is just the most visible..but torrents will always be underground.

[Duper]

for those of us here in the states (on the western side at any rate) I've see D3 in 7/11 for 10 bucks. they've been selling legacy games now for about a year from 6 to 10 dollars.

7/11 is a convience store chain here, same as Plaid Pantry, or what's that one in the south? Triad? (it's been too long since I was in Florida)

[Isaac]

Descent 1-2 would be abandonware if it weren't for those who mod it.

[Gekko71]

Descent 1-2 would be abandonware if it weren't for those who mod it.

Surely if it's still being sold as a commercial product, it doesn't qualify as abandonware.

We're well into the long tail for Descent sales sure (and have been for many years) but that doesn't mean that it's abandonware.

[Isaac]

That's true.

[Duper]

Descent 1-2 would be abandonware if it weren't for those who mod it.

correction. It would be abandonware if Interplay lost interest in the title and parallax (you know who they are) were willing to let go of all rights to the titles. Most abandonware -TRUE abandoneware was made by companies that no longer exist. Like stuff made by Acclaim.

[Isaac]

I guess crippleware.