A huge drama regarding the Polish gamedev scene was unravelled yesterday. A massive mod for Gothic 2 called The History of Khorinis (Dzieje Khorinis in Polish) was officially cancelled. Why would people care about a mod for a series that’s under the radar for many people? Gothic series has had a huge cult following in the country and it equates to a massive community. Then, there were the promises of the modding team regarding the project – it was supposed to be huge and was to feature voice acting from many prominent Polish actors (the voice acting of the first game in the series certainly helped with establishing it in the Polish market). The modding team has also generated a lot of press coverage for the mod and the hype was real. I’m not going to analyse why the project folded, as there is insufficient info on that front. We’ll go over their statement posted yesterday on the project’s Facebook page and we’ll conduct a SWOT analysis of it.
The original statement’s copy
“Farewell and the Last Information about the Status of the Project
The History of Khorinis team has made a decision to discontinue work on the modification and say goodbye to the fans. From this point, we would like to explain the reasons for this decision and emphasize a few matters.
The main reason for discontinuing the work is the lack of communication with the former main coordinator of the project, who was responsible, among other things, for the preparation of dubbing. We did not receive a definite answer whether the dubbing would be recorded, so we assumed it couldn’t be counted on 100%. The situation regarding the limited amount of recordings of the ‘Nestors,’ (original voice actors) who have already passed away, is also unclear. The History of Khorinis without the promised “original” dubbing loses its meaning. We also regret that the recordings of the ‘Nestors’ will not be implemented into the modification. However, we hope that the copyright holder will be able to use them in a positive way.
Some time ago we decided to reduce the “Vaduz” part (the HoK 1) and combine it with Khorinis (the HoK 2) in order to increase the likelihood of preparing voiceovers for both previously planned parts of the modification. Due to the unclear status of the voiceover work and too many issues in script development, we were unable to determine a clear course of action. From March of this year to August, we devoted our time to script revisions and the design of the further storyline (Khorinis).
Running an inflated PR that raised players’ hopes for an ambitious project with a star-studded cast , was a mistake on the part of the Team.
Many Gothic modification projects have failed due to a lack of motivation, and it’s similar here, but we want it to be clear to you that the lack of motivation stemmed from mismanagement that no one has the strength to fix anymore.
We APOLOGIZE to all fans who were anticipating the mod, sending us kind or bitter but constructive words and all those who financially supported us on the YouTube channel.
From this point, we would also like to congratulate the success of the Gothic II Chronicles of Myrtana team. A team that transformed true passion into something that actually came to life, even though it was initially met with misunderstanding from the fandom. We’re pleased that they managed to turn it into a good mod that captured the Gothic community’s interest enough to leave them hungry for more.
We bow low, bid farewell and go our own way. The History of Khorinis 2008-2023.
Regards, The History of Khorinis team.”
Strengths:
- The header is eye-catching and it sets the tone for the recipient.
- The most important info is in the first sentence.
- Some of the problems that led to this situation were identified, such as the lack of communication with the previous manager, not having the entire voiceover recorded, lack of motivation and the inability to force the project in the right direction.
- Congratulations to The Chronicles of Myrtana team (another Gothic 2 mod, made by a big part of the modders who had worked on THoK but split from the project).
- It has an apology. An apology is a strong statement to make, but many people will go out of their way to not apologise even when such an activity is due.
Weaknesses:
- The missing voiceover clips seem like a poor justification for deleting the mod.
- The PR team seems to be put in the position of scapegoats for doing their job well.
- Putting a huge part of the blame on the ex-coordinator seems in poor taste.
- It exposes how disjointed and disorganised the work on the project was. Nobody expects a modding team to be extremely highly organised and always on time, but it seems that having the voiceover done before having the script finished was a huge oversight and a mistake from the workflow point of view.
- The message states that there exists a rightsholder for the recordings, but it doesn’t name the individual, nor does it address them or describe the relationship between the modding team and the rightsholder and it seems to be one of the main issues regarding the case.
- There’s a lack of information regarding the funds that the community provided via donations and Patreon – what will be done with them, if they are even available, will there be a refund of sorts.
- The statement seems disjointed and it touches on many topics, but barely any are thoroughly explained.
- Minor spelling mistakes.
- Some statements are practically repeated (just as in the header and in the paragraph right below it).
Opportunities
- Even though not extremely flattering, the message to the CoM team possibly sets a nice ground for the people who worked on THoK to join their team or another team working on other mods for Gohtic or other games.
- Showing that they made some efforts to limit the amount of work needed on the mod presents the team in a somehow positive light and makes them seem more reasonable in their judgement.
- They didn’t say that they would not publish the assets for any modding teams that would be interested in incorporating them into their projects. There’s a possibility that some of the mod will be “scavenged” and repurposed.
Threats
- This message showcases that the development and management were chaotic at best.
- The statement about the PR team’s efforts may negatively impact the careers of those involved in that branch of the project, despite them doing their job decently.
- Not having the Polish voiceover ready being stated as a main reason for cancelling the project may place doubt about the quality of the mod itself, in its international release. It also shows clear favouritism towards the Polish part of the community (which could be somehow justified, as a huge part of the community, possibly a majority is Polish).
- Putting the blame on 3rd parties, such as the ex-coordinator, seems like burning bridges. The Polish gamedev community is quite tightly-knit, so doing that is, at best, an alarming thing to do.
- The only issues called by name here were the lack of cooperation between the ex-coordinator and the team, the incomplete voiceover, the efforts of the PR team and the lack of motivation due to mismanagement. It’s quite odd that the devs and graphic designers weren’t named if others were. It could also be a good thing, as those who managed the team didn’t put the blame on them – why do that to those responsible for the PR, though?
- The statement ignores their previous statement from May, in which they said that the mod will be released and may seem dishonest in this context.
Having analysed the statement, let’s create one that would make for a better read and would mitigate some of the issues.
My version of the statement’s copy
The Last Information about the Status of the Project and a farewell
The History of Khorinis team has made a decision to discontinue work on the modification. We apologise for letting the community down.
The main reason for discontinuing the work is the issues regarding the status of the voiceover. It wasn’t certain whether it would be completed or not. As we believe it was crucial for delivering the experience as it was envisioned, we decided to halt the work indefinitely. There was also a problem regarding the use of voice lines recorded by the actors who had already passed away – and it was of a legal nature.
Despite making the effort to limit the overbearing scope of the project, we were unable to establish the proper workflow and modify the script to make it do justice to the experience. The biggest obstacle was the fact that we decided to start recording the voiceovers before having everything else sorted out. In the end, it rendered us unable to create The History of Khorinis and to meet the high expectations of the community.
We still need to properly close the project down. Therefore, a message regarding what will be done with the assets and funds (mainly those donated by the community) will be released in the future. We also strongly encourage gaming studios to hire the people who’ve worked on game and level design, assets and the PR for the game, as they did quite a good job, despite their efforts not coming to fruition.
From this point, we would also like to congratulate the success of the Gothic II Chronicles of Myrtana team. A team that transformed true passion into something that actually came to life. It’s heartwarming they managed to turn it into a good mod that captured the Gothic community’s interest and provided a great experience.
We bow low, bid farewell and hope for your understanding.
Regards, The History of Khorinis team
2008-2023
This version is simpler, nobody’s thrown under the bus, and the main issues (and what I believe to be the real main issue – the overreliance on the voiceover and creating it at a wrong point in time) were addressed. Additionally, a statement regarding the assets and finances was made (which is often met with at least a partly positive response from the community) and a message endorsing the people responsible for the areas of the project that had little to do with management was also written. I also took the majority of the blame off the ex-coordinator’s shoulders – at least in terms of the public reception.
Turns out it was quite a challenging yet fun exercise and if you deal with video games marketing or copywriting as a whole, I strongly encourage you to rewrite the statement and to make it better. What do you think about the analysis and both versions? Do you think the modding team did a good job with the statement?
Conclusion
Writing such a statement is always an extremely hard task. Especially when you’re emotionally involved in the project. Do you think they did a good job with it? I think it wasn’t the best effort, but it got the main message across and this is what counts for the community and the press – a somewhat decent result. It also showed us the state of some gaming projects that fail due to unreasonable expectations, mismanagement, conflict of interest and such. Not a pretty side of the industry, but a very real and present one. I also didn’t mention the previous craziness regarding the project, as the alleged granting of a tester position for nude photos, a leak of a highly unfinished build and many others – it was intentional, as I wanted to look at this statement in an almost perfect vacuum. The story behind the development is too big and I don’t have time to cover it all and would probably not do a very good job at it. As I post weekly on Mondays and the history surfaced yesterday, it would also mean that I wouldn’t have time to send messages to and get responses from all of the parties involved in this case.
If you need help with writing statements and community management for your gaming project, write a message to jakub@heapsagency.com – I’m up for hire!
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