First off, thanks for all of the kudos, I really appreciate it, and will continue to hopefully deserve such kind thoughts!
Regarding this ...
Quote:
Originally Posted by phenom
So not to be the pisser on this big bowl of Cheerios, but will the development of OOTP Online take away from the development of OOTP 9 and the implementation of fixes from OOTP 8?
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Well, a definite "no change" regarding OOTP 8 / OOTP Baseball 2007, because that patch is like 96% done. In fact, it might have been out this week, if it weren't for some people being out of the office that we need. So, we're really hoping to wrap that up shortly. (REALLY)
We've said it before, but unless there is some sort of crisis (like a bug crops up that causes massive, widespread crashing), this will be the last patch for this version of the game, so OOTP 8 / OOTP Baseball 2007 shouldn't be affected at all by OOTP 9 or OOTP Online.
Regarding OOTP9, well, I think it will have
some impact. After all, it's a very small team, and now you're talking about developing two separate products. That said, the engine for OOTP Online will be OOTP 9, so OOTP Online will actually be a much smaller task than developing a completely separate game, and it's also an initiative that has more things that non-Markus people can work on, such as building a web front end for the online game, and fleshing out the business model.
In reality, there has to be some truth to the notion that OOTP Online will take some time away that would otherwise be spent on OOTP 9. If we had 50 people, that might not be true. But with 2 developers and an "everything else" guy like me, I'd be lying if I said otherwise.
That said, OOTP 9 is going to be great in its' own right, not just OOTP 8 with a new sticker on it. As with 2007, OOTP 9 will have new features and improvements, and we fully expect it to be worth moving to the new game. But, that's still a long way away.
On top of this, I think that all three of us have learned a lot about effective development and business processes over the past 3 years. In that sense, I expect things like the beta process to be growing ever more efficient. We had such a great team last year, many of those people will be back, and in a better position to take leadership roles in testing and so forth.
So, overall, I feel confident that both OOTP 9 and OOTP Online are things to look forward to!
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