Congrats, Kael!

[Mallipeep]

He added, "...In turn, a full-time experienced producer on Elemental will ensure that subsequent updates and expansions get the kind of attention they need and deserve." Wardell said after the next game update, the studio will begin work on an expansion that will be made free to all people that currently own Elemental. The CEO will return to his role as executive producer and AI developer on the title.

Well, they obviously have to roll some major expansion-like update out, to get that expansion reviewed to recover for the "special" launch. I hope they will call it something "fantasy/mediavalish" but with slight sarcastic hint at how its actually a giant patch.


Also grats to the Guy, alwas nice to see someone combine his hobby and career.

 

[ColdFever]

Thanks to everyone for the kind words. I enjoyed being a modder, but the thought of focusing on game development full time just about blows my mind.

Congratulations, Kael. I never understood why Firaxis did not try to hire you after your great work on Civ4 (or they did and you said no?). My best wishes to your cooperation with Stardock!

 

[Dairuka]

I just bought Elemental off of Impulse to support Kael, it's the least I could do for all of his efforts in making Fall from Heaven 2, a mod I would've gladly paid full game price for.

Good luck in your future endeavors Kael; even those of us lurking in the shadows support you immensely.

 

[Ninja2]

+1, congratulations Kael! How awesome to get to develop games full time, I guess most of us can only dream of that!

 

[Cilpot]

Congratulations, Kael And thank you for all the good times I've had with Fall From Heaven!

On the one hand I'm a bit sad to see Kael depart from Civ-modding. My Fall From Heaven II games in Civ IV are by far the most epic and fun games I have had.

On the other hand I'm really happy that he's helping develop Elemental. This is a game that looks right up my alley, but I've been reluctant in buying it yet due to the numerous bugs reported.

For that matter, Xienwolf is supposed to be working on Eden.

What is this "Eden" you speak of?

 

[Coffeemonkey]

Congratulations Kael!

I am a huge fan on the work you and your team did on the FFH mod.

Congrats!

 

[Bringa]

Aaaaand now I'm thinking of buying Elemental. Even though this probably means no Kael-led FfH for Civ 5, this is great news. Congratulations!

 

[ash874]

congragulations
if what you did would not be enough to get into the industry than i dont know what would

 

[wilebill]

Congratulations Kael! Been a Stardock fan since the original Galactic Civilizations for Windows.

I am now even more confident that Elemental War of Magic will turn out very well indeed!

 

[snoochems]

And 2K will not offer a free expansion, no. It doesn't have to; CiV players were not tricked into purchasing an abortion of a game for full price, for the privilege of becoming alpha testers.

I'm not sure if you're being funny, or actually think that CiV is not in Alpha?

I would certainly not have purchased CiV if I had have known it was going to be... well, craptastic.

 

[Nadrak]

I love fantasy games, I love Civilization series...so I loved FFH...but when I saw the Elemental I was confused...it really has some potential, but that graphic...have you seen units close-up in an inventory? Terrible squared faces like from game 10 years old.

 

[Abremms]

I'm not sure if you're being funny, or actually think that CiV is not in Alpha?

I would certainly not have purchased CiV if I had have known it was going to be... well, craptastic.

not to derail the thread, but V is in infinitely better shape than Elemental was at launch. V is playable, and its even fun for the vast majority of average players. Elemental was bad. like, real bad those few of us who could get it to run for more than an hour were greeted by a clusterfrak of broken mechanics, terrible balance and generally poor gameplay.

V has a few bugs and needs some tweaks, but don't compare it to Elemental.

also, its worth noting that Elemental now is a vastly different game than it was at release, the majority of the bugs are cleaned up, and the game is fun to play. with Kael onboard, i have no doubt it will only continue to improve.

 

[Ribusprissin]

wow grats

 

[MisterBarca]

not to derail the thread, but V is in infinitely better shape than Elemental was at launch. V is playable, and its even fun for the vast majority of average players. Elemental was bad. like, real bad those few of us who could get it to run for more than an hour were greeted by a clusterfrak of broken mechanics, terrible balance and generally poor gameplay.

V has a few bugs and needs some tweaks, but don't compare it to Elemental.

I wholeheartedly agree. The utter, wholesale crappiness of Elemental at launch was like nothing I've ever witnessed in games I've played (and I am an old fart who has bought every meaningful turn-based game since the dawn of civilization).

Also, while I am happy that Kael gets a crack at improving Elemental, I am pessimistic that he will actually be given a free rein, given Wardell's marked arrogance, self-absorption, and refusal to heed constructive criticism throughout the beta process.

 

[DirtyFinger]

I wholeheartedly agree. The utter, wholesale crappiness of Elemental at launch was like nothing I've ever witnessed in games I've played (and I am an old fart who has bought every meaningful turn-based game since the dawn of civilization).

Also, while I am happy that Kael gets a crack at improving Elemental, I am pessimistic that he will actually be given a free rein, given Wardell's marked arrogance, self-absorption, and refusal to heed constructive criticism throughout the beta process.

Quite so!

By the way, now that Frogboy has Kael under wraps he got his old arrogance back in full. He even resumed asking critics to leave unless they have made a game of their own. All this to the usual cheers of the fanboys.

An important advice to Kael: If Frogboy invites you to a weekend retreat for employee bonding, then run like hell.
Unless you dig that sort of thing, of course.

 

[Mongolia Jones]

Congrats to Kael, hope everything works out.

FFH2 is a game that transcends games. It's my top 3 of all time fun games and I'm a relative old fart. The thing that made FFH2 so wonderful to play was that it had so much depth. I remember playing one civ over and over (the one where you are only able to build 5 mega cities) till I got so good I almost never lost playing them.

Then I switched to the vampire civ where I actually had to relearn how to play... as if I purchased brand new game <- phenomenal.

 

[AljayBoy]

Nice one Kael, congrats and well done.

 

[Jharii]

Congratulations, Kael.

This is great news for Elemental and CiV both!

Elemental gets that shot of adrenalin it needs from a proven (legendary) developer in the modding community, while CiV now has a modding hole to fill with the next up-and-coming visionary.

It's a win-win.

 

[jimkirk]

congrats kael .. and good luck at stardock .... once upon a time i bought galciv2 one of the reasons was it didnt have drm .. it wasnt too bad for a turn based game and my impression was the developers were pretty honest with their customers .. hope the same happens with elemental
and thanx for ffh2 it made civ4 worth it

 

[Kruelgor]

I'm a little confused as it appears this game has already been produced, and what happened to Scott Tykoski? I assume Kael will be responsible for what? patches?