The company is 110% focused on getting Wildstar to market on our advertised release date of June 3, 2014. That's not too far off, so you can imagine where our heads are at right now.
I cannot speak for the company, but if it were up to me I'd wait for the sales numbers to roll in to determine if transition is even an issue. Matt From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Meng-Yang Lu Sent: Monday, March 17, 2014 4:20 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Autodesk response Matt, Considering your previous emails about retaining legacy, I got the notion you didn't know until the last minute since you were still writing emails about date integrity. What are you guys planning to do? -Lu On Mon, Mar 17, 2014 at 4:11 PM, Matt Lind <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: In response to 'B', Autodesk showed up at our office the very moment the news went live to everybody else. In essence, we didn't get any warning either. We were told we're one of the larger Softimage customers. No NDA's, roadmaps to the future, or anything else. Just, "Hey, Soft is EOL. We'll toss you some Max and/or Maya licenses at no extra cost to help you along for the next 2 years, after which you can no longer use Soft. Any questions?". This is before the policy of ending use of Softimage after Feb 1, 2016 was revised, of course. Matt From: [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> [mailto:[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>] On Behalf Of Raffaele Fragapane Sent: Monday, March 17, 2014 3:44 PM To: [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> Subject: Re: Autodesk response Lets make something very clear here. A) big shops might not be voicing their concerns for reasons other than some of the utterly retarded conspiracy theories that are emerging. Reasons might be that CEOs and producers in a place big enough simply DO NOT give enough of a damn about this, or that they are not a bunch of fanatics but they deal with business the way business is dealt with, or even that it's not infrequent for shops having a "no vendor bias" policy which extends to publicity, positive or negative, of any kind tied to a specific vendor. B) the forewarning was a small handful of weeks for the luckiest, as short as 10 days for those at the end of it, and many were simply left out out of sheer incompetence (See Glassworks). C) the shops you mention might be considering to flip the finger to AD as well. As usual I can't speak for, or even imply what is going on in, Animal Logic, but I know first hand that more than a place was already trying their absolute hardest to marginalize as much as possible integration of AD products. Do you think how this latest move was handled is helping? D) Last but not least, I don't know where this dysfunctional theory some people seem to have that big shops get bribed by vendors to promote things to the peons. Sure, it sporadically happened in the past, especially in SGI days, but ultimately the margins in VFX and Feature Animation are so small you have no idea. The singular sole priority in any big shop is to work as efficiently as possible financially. If it involves using AD products AD itself could be helmed by Satan and have a side-trade of illegal arms contraband and AD products would still be bought. If working with AD is potentially financially damaging, given how small the cost of software itself in a pipe is these days when the pipe is wide and long enough, many birds would be instantaneously flipped at AD. Honestly guys, get a grip. There's no conspiracy theory, just some people are a lot more rational and more divested across resources than those frothing over it. It doesn't mean they aren't saddened, or suddenly even more concerned about AD's client policies, but they don't all have XSI tattoos on their buttocks. On Tue, Mar 18, 2014 at 6:16 AM, Jason S <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: The idea of prewarnings, is for exactly that.. letting bigger shops in to the decision & start transitions first, gives a feeling of preferential treatment, & not much room to dissaprove when it all silent and top secret, so you go ahead saying.. "darn, but what other choice?" And when it all comes out, not only do the prewarned (with the loudest voices) not speak-out (already transitioned halfway) but then serve as example leaders, more-or-less willingly leading the way to the "better" way! Yay!
