I posted this over on the other site.
The kickstarter mentions a few names but it doesn’t seem like Kurvitz or any had any involvement in this, and one of the leads of this project is an AI techbro consultant claiming he was one of the original creators. And yep, Longdue sued one of the original writers and won.
This one’s a HARD pass.
Having achieved its £25,000 goal in just three hours
Yeah, that’s not what it costs to create that game. They openly communicate that in the description, fair enough, but the headline not giving that context makes it sound like much more than it actually is.
ZAUM
Yeah, that’s gonna be a no from me dawg
Former ZA/UM devs.
I haven’t delved too deep into the shitshow that followed that game, and I know it’s convoluted as hell, but it seems like that’s referring to previous associates of the studio, not the studio itself. The page mentions Martin Luiga in association with it, for whatever that’s worth.
The minds of ZAUM, not the losers who own it
It’s extremely puzzling to me that Martin Luiga jumped onto this project when I’ve heard so many bad things about Longdue, not least their ongoing feud with Argo Tuulik. I thought the bad blood was primarily between Kurvitz and Tuulik, not Luiga. But yes, Martin being involved in this project does legitimise it somewhat. I’m still more optimistic about Summer Eternal and Red Info, as far as the splinter studios go.
Agreed. I’m more excited to see what Summer Eternal does.
This is the only team out of this fallout that’s worth keeping an eye on imo. The other teams feel like they’re just trying to ride the hype for the money.
Oh yuck.
Just a FYI, the turds at Longdue making “Hopetown” are suing Argo Tuulik one of the lead writers for the OG Disco Elysium in some lame effort to snuff out any competition from Argo’s own project.
Luckily the community has really rallied behind him so things are looking up. Still I wouldn’t give Longdue/Riaz Moola/Hopetown (ugh what kind of hack came up with that name?) any more positive press because they sure as hell don’t deserve it :o
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-disco-elysium-writer-survive-the-winter
Tuulik is more than a lead writer, he is one of the co-creators of the setting as one of the players of the original Elysium tabletop sessions alongside Martin Luiga (with Robert Kurvitz being the DM).