SimCity leads leave Maxis to form Jellygrade Studio

[wanderer27]

Bouncing around the Net and just ran across this:

http://www.vg247.com/2013/07/16/simcity-leads-leave-maxis-to-form-jellygrade-studio/

SimCity creative director Ocean Quigley has left Maxis along with lead architect Andrew Willmott and lead gameplay engineer Dan Moskowitz to set up a new studio called Jellygrade


“We were lead developers on SimCity, SimCity 4, Spore and The Sims2. We love making simulations,” wrote Quigley. “We’re making a simulation about the dawn of life on earth; about lava, water, rock and the emergence of the first primordial creatures.

I would like to think that one day we might actually get a real Sim City (hopefully from these guys under another name) instead of this latest cluster EA has laid on everyone.


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[acheron]

Their simulation idea sounds cool, but apparently they're making it for ipads.

 

[natto fire]

So they are making SimEarth for tablets? Hopefully they reach out to real gamers after hocking enough "apps" to fund a proper crew. Simulations on a largely casual gaming device might be a tough sell at first.

 

[CPA]

So they are making SimEarth for tablets? Hopefully they reach out to real gamers after hocking enough "apps" to fund a proper crew. Simulations on a largely casual gaming device might be a tough sell at first.

LOL, was going to say the same thing.

Oh, and what's your pick in the "Simcity Server Shut-down Pool". I'm going with 9 months.

 

[crownjules]

And the meat grinder that is EA continues to do its thing. If it were dev studios that I didn't like, it would be somewhat amusing this revolving door of devs going into EA (having been purchased) and then devs leaving EA (to form their own studios, again).

A new SimEarth would be really cool. I remember trying to play that game when I was 10 or so and being overwhelmed.

 

[BrightCandle]

I can't blame the Sim City mess mostly on EA. EA might be responsible for the DRM which is what won the headlines but that is not even close to being the biggest problem with Sim City. The real problem with that game was game breaking bugs, literally thousands of them. Hundreds of serious bugs, including ones where you just loose a city forever never to load again still remain half a year later. The patches have focused on adding DLC and airships and other rubbish. Right now if you start a city you likely have about 10-15 hours before it will die and you can never play it again, but you can add airships! This game is terribly written, the simulation engine approach is actually terrible, it makes no sense at all.

My advice would have been to these guys not to quit their day job, but it seems they already did that. I hope they take the quality of their product more seriously in the future, because if they release an indy game as broken as Sim City they wont be in business after doing so. The problems with that game aren't EA's fault, that lies squarely with the guys that wrote the game in the way they did, these guys are likely responsible for most of the problems with Sim City.

 

[CPA]

I can't blame the Sim City mess mostly on EA. EA might be responsible for the DRM which is what won the headlines but that is not even close to being the biggest problem with Sim City. The real problem with that game was game breaking bugs, literally thousands of them. Hundreds of serious bugs, including ones where you just loose a city forever never to load again still remain half a year later. The patches have focused on adding DLC and airships and other rubbish. Right now if you start a city you likely have about 10-15 hours before it will die and you can never play it again, but you can add airships! This game is terribly written, the simulation engine approach is actually terrible, it makes no sense at all.

My advice would have been to these guys not to quit their day job, but it seems they already did that. I hope they take the quality of their product more seriously in the future, because if they release an indy game as broken as Sim City they wont be in business after doing so. The problems with that game aren't EA's fault, that lies squarely with the guys that wrote the game in the way they did, these guys are likely responsible for most of the problems with Sim City.

You can't even blame EA on the DRM. Both EA and Maxis stated it was Maxis' idea as part of "their vision" for the game.

 

[smackababy]

You can't even blame EA on the DRM. Both EA and Maxis stated it was Maxis' idea as part of "their vision" for the game.

Their vision was much grander than what they even delivered. I am sure when they brought the idea up to EA, EA was like "requires online? F*ck yeah we'll go along with it! No piracy means more money!"


I'd also like to point out, they didn't mention the core SimCity games we love. SimCity 2000 and SimCity 3000. They didn't work on those? Not really that interesting. I'm sure a Kickstarter will pop up though with a "Hey! We made a good game 15 years ago, give us millions of dollars please" pitch, though.

 

[lozina]

sounds like they made their bed but now dont want to sleep in it (dont want to fix the problems in SimCity)

instead they want to go on a tangent making some new piece of shit for a piece of shit gaming platform

 

[nageov3t]

a stealth remake of Sim Earth would be cool.

I loved the concept, but it was a little over my head when it first came out (and I was like 9-10)

 

[Albatross]

I would love a Telltale type success,but Ipad?

 

[lord_emperor]

How long until they're re-purchased by EA?

 

[Bateluer]

Their simulation idea sounds cool, but apparently they're making it for ipads.

Bravo sir, you raised my expectations and then smashed them.