On the topic of Legends 3
This week saw kind of a rough bump for the outlook on Legends 3, and I suppose I am somewhat responsible for that, although the response to it was not as cataclysmic as I expected it might be. And in the end, it is just a simple fact: Rockman DASH 3 was removed from the front page of Capcom of Japan. It may mean nothing, and you can read into it any way you like.
However, I will go on record in saying I think the game is in trouble. This is not just a reaction to the button being removed, but considering the whole of the development up until now. While I don't necessarily believe the game is going to be cancelled (though I am taking the prospect more seriously), there is more than enough empirical evidence to suggest Legends 3 is having rough times, and may in fact have been troubled from the start.
Let's go way back to even before the beginning. Work on the project probably began around June of 2010. This is back when a source tipped us off that Legends 3 had been given the go ahead. Soon after, though, said source felt unsure about the legitimacy of his intel and we just put it aside. We probably would have put it aside even if our source felt completely confident about it. I've come to learn that breaking big leaks like that have little value in the long run. Even with hard evidence, we could have broke it and caused a big uproar and pranced about in the attention. the next day, though, the info is out and nobody cares that you revealed it. Plus you've made Capcom wary of you, which is not a good practice when you run a gaming site, especially a Mega Man one. I doubt Das Reviews have gotten anymore support from Capcom since CES 2010.
Later, Legends 3 would be formally announced either late September or early October. It was pretty much a week after we put out our first Megacast and even talked to jgonzo about Legends 3 in speculation. There were various hints leading up to it, especially Keiji Inafune blogging that he promised to "make that game."
I believe Inafune may factor in Legends 3's troubles as much as he does its conception. I think it's pretty fair to say Inafune came to be a pretty cocky and ambitious guy. He did recognize the problems the Japanese game industry faces with their structure and cultural preconceptions (whether or not he truly knows the solutions is debatable). A lot of things can be said about Inafune, but what factors most here is he was fine with using his position to push through games he wanted to make. I wish I could find the interview, but Inafune practically boasted that he pitched Dead Rising to Capcom, they turned it down, and he went ahead and worked on it anyway. His ploy was to develop it up to a level where Capcom could not turn it down due to the amount of resources already put into it.
So let's look at September of last year. Inafune already knows he is going to leave Capcom. He's wanted to make Legends 3 for years but the previous games did not sell well enough to warrant it. He's had fans constantly beg him to make it. So as a final send off to them, he announces Legends 3. I don't think it was a sudden, spur of the moment thing to trick up his bosses. This was planned from the start to employ the gimmick of using the Devroom. Since he could not prove Legends 3 would sell well, the Devroom idea was meant to give Legends 3 an interesting angle, something new and experimental to try. It would also make it harder for Capcom to turn the game down once it got rolling. By announcing it, and getting fans invested in it, it would be very difficult for Capcom to stop production. This was the gamble he made as he left Capcom. Note that this of course is my speculation.
With the Devroom, Capcom announced the hope to get 69,000 members. This was meant to be the initial indication of interest in the game. If 50,000 people joined the Devroom, it might be reasonable to speculate 500,000 people would buy the game. The reason 69,000 specifically is because the numerical pronunciation in Japanese can be "twisted" into "rokkuman" (this is why 69 turns up in Mega Man games here and there, it's nothing perverted). To this day, I don't think they got close to reaching that milestone. I can't recall the last time a full count was provided, but I believe it was just over 10,000. And after the initial launch, the Devroom's rate of expansion is only going to get slower and slower.
The next attempt to gauge interest was perhaps the cruelest twist of fate. Legends 3 was intended to be demoed at an Akihabara event at the end of March, but this was cancelled due to the Touhoku earthquake and tsunamis. Not only was the event cancelled, but development went quiet for nearly a month following the tragedy. Though I am not so tasteless to push aside the gravity of what happened, I still do have to wonder how things might be different for Legends 3 had that event still occurred.
The next potential event for showcasing Legends 3 was Captivate. I think by this point there's no harm for me to say that they were contemplating bringing it there. I was eventually informed by jgonzo that having Legends 3 on hand was one of the determining factors to my invitation. Don't get me wrong, it was still a fun event and they showed off some neat games, but I'm not exactly on the record for my stalwart devotion to Street Fighter and Resident Evil.
Later in April, the Devroom kickstarted again and we were shown the Prototype Version. This was by far the most exciting time to be a part of the Devroom. The game looked damned good, and we were going to get to taste it soon. Around this time it also came out that Legends 3 was never official greenlit, and the Prototype Version was intended to really gauge interest in the title's commercial viability. This honestly should have been a really alarming sign, and certainly it did make some worried. But for the most part, seeing Legends 3 in action and knowing we would get the Prototype soon cast aside nearly all fears. The Prototype would come out that would make all the difference.
Sadly, a mere two to three weeks before it was intended to launch with the eShop, the Prototype was delayed indefinitely. This should have been the second alarming sign. The Prototype was essentially finished, its contents were generally announced. We watched the devs sample the game. We read Nintendo Power's take on it. Everything about it seemed fine. But they wanted to delay it for the purpose of polishing it up. Some caught on to the strangeness of this sentiment, since a prototype by definition is not something known for its refined nature. This time I more blame the devs for reason this turn of events wasn't especially alarming. The language used about the delay was fairly vague and hard to draw conclusions from. I figured it might just be a couple more weeks, which is why I extended the contest deadline on TMMN. But now that it's been well over a month, that should not be a good sign. It should not take nearly so long to brush up a mere demonstration version of a game, one that was practically finished by then.
E3 came and went with no sign of the game. Furthermore, after the Prototype was delayed, things got pretty quiet again in the devroom. The only event to take place was the mascot event, and the final deciding of Mega Man's design. Aside from that, all the content was pretty much Kinako reports, which for the most part are quaint distractions. Up until the delay, staff blogs were fairly usual week by week, showing off various design elements of the game. Since the delay was announced, we have only gotten three staff blog updates: one for Rock Day, one for Ishihara showing off the creation of the promo art, and one where Greg addressed the Japanese Devroom. No real progress reports on the game itself.
And that about brings us to the present. Now the DASH 3 button is gone from Capcom of Japan. Replaced with, of all things, a Monster Hunter event advertisement. Granted, Monster Hunter is huge in Japan, but it's still just an event. The button for Mercenaries remains and that's a game that's already been out in Japan for a month. The button being removed itself may not mean much, but considering it with everything else I've mentioned you have to wonder.
Another thing to consider is that Capcom has made no comment on the situation. I have seen Greg browsing the Devroom boards, he is certainly aware of what's going on, not to mention with people messaging him about it as well. To my knowledge there has not yet been a response. It would take all of a minute for Greg to respond "Don't worry, just be patient for future updates." They gave as much of a response to people concerning DmC, and that ordeal was over freakin' hair color. I don't see why he would need any approval to make this kind of comment for us, provided it were the truth. As it stands, I already mailed Greg inquiring about the health of Legends 3 back at the beginning of the week. I've gotten no response from him.
SDCC is the next event fans are looking forward to. If it's not there, that would be inarguable proof something is up with the game, though honestly I wonder if we'll make it that far before the potentially ugly truth is revealed. If a good update is planned for SDCC, they need to at least hint at it. It is not good practice to just let your community burn like a forest fire. It's cruel to let people suffer over nothing.
Some have argued the button being removed is not significant because the game is still not coming out for a while. In that case, why was the button up to begin with? The thing about Legends 3 is that it's very tied to user input. Thus it's very important that some kind of link or advertisement exist to bring people in. Otherwise the only people who are going to go to it are those who already know it's there. Capcom Unity should have always had some kind of banner or link going to the Devroom on their front page.
It's also worth mentioning that slow sales of the 3DS are not doing anything to help the case for Legends 3. Frankly, Nintendo's direction as a whole is not a great sign for a simple and fun game like Mega Man. With the 3DS and now Wii U, Nintendo seems to be returning to their N64 and GC days. The N64 era is not an especially prominent one for Mega Man.
I really do have hope for this game still. It looks bad, but I still want to to succeed more than anything. And I think it's good for the fans to have fear in them. It will make them rally for the game, and demand information. Being optimistic is well and all, but it makes people complacent. It makes us not take an active role in finding out what's going on. It makes us not rally for support because we just want to "believe everything's okay." Mega Man Universe's cancellation was a surprise. It shouldn't have been surprising. With an element of fear, people will take this game more seriously and show greater support for it.
My only hope now is that it's not already too late to make a difference.
However, I will go on record in saying I think the game is in trouble. This is not just a reaction to the button being removed, but considering the whole of the development up until now. While I don't necessarily believe the game is going to be cancelled (though I am taking the prospect more seriously), there is more than enough empirical evidence to suggest Legends 3 is having rough times, and may in fact have been troubled from the start.
Let's go way back to even before the beginning. Work on the project probably began around June of 2010. This is back when a source tipped us off that Legends 3 had been given the go ahead. Soon after, though, said source felt unsure about the legitimacy of his intel and we just put it aside. We probably would have put it aside even if our source felt completely confident about it. I've come to learn that breaking big leaks like that have little value in the long run. Even with hard evidence, we could have broke it and caused a big uproar and pranced about in the attention. the next day, though, the info is out and nobody cares that you revealed it. Plus you've made Capcom wary of you, which is not a good practice when you run a gaming site, especially a Mega Man one. I doubt Das Reviews have gotten anymore support from Capcom since CES 2010.
Later, Legends 3 would be formally announced either late September or early October. It was pretty much a week after we put out our first Megacast and even talked to jgonzo about Legends 3 in speculation. There were various hints leading up to it, especially Keiji Inafune blogging that he promised to "make that game."
I believe Inafune may factor in Legends 3's troubles as much as he does its conception. I think it's pretty fair to say Inafune came to be a pretty cocky and ambitious guy. He did recognize the problems the Japanese game industry faces with their structure and cultural preconceptions (whether or not he truly knows the solutions is debatable). A lot of things can be said about Inafune, but what factors most here is he was fine with using his position to push through games he wanted to make. I wish I could find the interview, but Inafune practically boasted that he pitched Dead Rising to Capcom, they turned it down, and he went ahead and worked on it anyway. His ploy was to develop it up to a level where Capcom could not turn it down due to the amount of resources already put into it.
So let's look at September of last year. Inafune already knows he is going to leave Capcom. He's wanted to make Legends 3 for years but the previous games did not sell well enough to warrant it. He's had fans constantly beg him to make it. So as a final send off to them, he announces Legends 3. I don't think it was a sudden, spur of the moment thing to trick up his bosses. This was planned from the start to employ the gimmick of using the Devroom. Since he could not prove Legends 3 would sell well, the Devroom idea was meant to give Legends 3 an interesting angle, something new and experimental to try. It would also make it harder for Capcom to turn the game down once it got rolling. By announcing it, and getting fans invested in it, it would be very difficult for Capcom to stop production. This was the gamble he made as he left Capcom. Note that this of course is my speculation.
With the Devroom, Capcom announced the hope to get 69,000 members. This was meant to be the initial indication of interest in the game. If 50,000 people joined the Devroom, it might be reasonable to speculate 500,000 people would buy the game. The reason 69,000 specifically is because the numerical pronunciation in Japanese can be "twisted" into "rokkuman" (this is why 69 turns up in Mega Man games here and there, it's nothing perverted). To this day, I don't think they got close to reaching that milestone. I can't recall the last time a full count was provided, but I believe it was just over 10,000. And after the initial launch, the Devroom's rate of expansion is only going to get slower and slower.
The next attempt to gauge interest was perhaps the cruelest twist of fate. Legends 3 was intended to be demoed at an Akihabara event at the end of March, but this was cancelled due to the Touhoku earthquake and tsunamis. Not only was the event cancelled, but development went quiet for nearly a month following the tragedy. Though I am not so tasteless to push aside the gravity of what happened, I still do have to wonder how things might be different for Legends 3 had that event still occurred.
The next potential event for showcasing Legends 3 was Captivate. I think by this point there's no harm for me to say that they were contemplating bringing it there. I was eventually informed by jgonzo that having Legends 3 on hand was one of the determining factors to my invitation. Don't get me wrong, it was still a fun event and they showed off some neat games, but I'm not exactly on the record for my stalwart devotion to Street Fighter and Resident Evil.
Later in April, the Devroom kickstarted again and we were shown the Prototype Version. This was by far the most exciting time to be a part of the Devroom. The game looked damned good, and we were going to get to taste it soon. Around this time it also came out that Legends 3 was never official greenlit, and the Prototype Version was intended to really gauge interest in the title's commercial viability. This honestly should have been a really alarming sign, and certainly it did make some worried. But for the most part, seeing Legends 3 in action and knowing we would get the Prototype soon cast aside nearly all fears. The Prototype would come out that would make all the difference.
Sadly, a mere two to three weeks before it was intended to launch with the eShop, the Prototype was delayed indefinitely. This should have been the second alarming sign. The Prototype was essentially finished, its contents were generally announced. We watched the devs sample the game. We read Nintendo Power's take on it. Everything about it seemed fine. But they wanted to delay it for the purpose of polishing it up. Some caught on to the strangeness of this sentiment, since a prototype by definition is not something known for its refined nature. This time I more blame the devs for reason this turn of events wasn't especially alarming. The language used about the delay was fairly vague and hard to draw conclusions from. I figured it might just be a couple more weeks, which is why I extended the contest deadline on TMMN. But now that it's been well over a month, that should not be a good sign. It should not take nearly so long to brush up a mere demonstration version of a game, one that was practically finished by then.
E3 came and went with no sign of the game. Furthermore, after the Prototype was delayed, things got pretty quiet again in the devroom. The only event to take place was the mascot event, and the final deciding of Mega Man's design. Aside from that, all the content was pretty much Kinako reports, which for the most part are quaint distractions. Up until the delay, staff blogs were fairly usual week by week, showing off various design elements of the game. Since the delay was announced, we have only gotten three staff blog updates: one for Rock Day, one for Ishihara showing off the creation of the promo art, and one where Greg addressed the Japanese Devroom. No real progress reports on the game itself.
And that about brings us to the present. Now the DASH 3 button is gone from Capcom of Japan. Replaced with, of all things, a Monster Hunter event advertisement. Granted, Monster Hunter is huge in Japan, but it's still just an event. The button for Mercenaries remains and that's a game that's already been out in Japan for a month. The button being removed itself may not mean much, but considering it with everything else I've mentioned you have to wonder.
Another thing to consider is that Capcom has made no comment on the situation. I have seen Greg browsing the Devroom boards, he is certainly aware of what's going on, not to mention with people messaging him about it as well. To my knowledge there has not yet been a response. It would take all of a minute for Greg to respond "Don't worry, just be patient for future updates." They gave as much of a response to people concerning DmC, and that ordeal was over freakin' hair color. I don't see why he would need any approval to make this kind of comment for us, provided it were the truth. As it stands, I already mailed Greg inquiring about the health of Legends 3 back at the beginning of the week. I've gotten no response from him.
SDCC is the next event fans are looking forward to. If it's not there, that would be inarguable proof something is up with the game, though honestly I wonder if we'll make it that far before the potentially ugly truth is revealed. If a good update is planned for SDCC, they need to at least hint at it. It is not good practice to just let your community burn like a forest fire. It's cruel to let people suffer over nothing.
Some have argued the button being removed is not significant because the game is still not coming out for a while. In that case, why was the button up to begin with? The thing about Legends 3 is that it's very tied to user input. Thus it's very important that some kind of link or advertisement exist to bring people in. Otherwise the only people who are going to go to it are those who already know it's there. Capcom Unity should have always had some kind of banner or link going to the Devroom on their front page.
It's also worth mentioning that slow sales of the 3DS are not doing anything to help the case for Legends 3. Frankly, Nintendo's direction as a whole is not a great sign for a simple and fun game like Mega Man. With the 3DS and now Wii U, Nintendo seems to be returning to their N64 and GC days. The N64 era is not an especially prominent one for Mega Man.
I really do have hope for this game still. It looks bad, but I still want to to succeed more than anything. And I think it's good for the fans to have fear in them. It will make them rally for the game, and demand information. Being optimistic is well and all, but it makes people complacent. It makes us not take an active role in finding out what's going on. It makes us not rally for support because we just want to "believe everything's okay." Mega Man Universe's cancellation was a surprise. It shouldn't have been surprising. With an element of fear, people will take this game more seriously and show greater support for it.
My only hope now is that it's not already too late to make a difference.