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My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

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Re: My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

#54

Post by test1235 »

agentwiggles wrote: post #4

This is really disappointing to read. Mick's soundtrack was a huge part of making DOOM 2016 and Eternal such great experiences. His talk at GDC where he goes into some of the process of creating the soundtrack is fantastic, so much fun to see the creativity he brought to the game's music. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4FNBMZsqrY The next DOOM will be a little less DOOMy without him.

For the longest time, that GDC video was the most watched on their channel. Even now, it still appears to be a close second.

I've watched it through twice myself, despite not even working in the game or music industry.

Re: My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

#55

Post by D13Fd »

This is so sad. I was unfamiliar with this whole dispute, but I've been a huge fan of the Doom 2016 soundtrack ever since that game was released. The music was absolutely essential to the game and it's amazing to me that they apparently didn't realize that and didn't treat the author as essential to the game development process.

I'm also worried that he apparently hasn't sued or settled yet. At least based on his story, it looks like he may have some amazing claims here, and any plaintiff-focused contract/IP firm worth its salt would be beating down his door to get this case. But some of his claims are likely state law claims that are subject to a statute of limitations that has either run at this point or is about to run, and settlement negotiations generally don't toll the statute of limitations. Get on it!

Re: My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

#56

Post by kmeisthax »

Chris2048 wrote: post #6

A lot of this feels a little "glutton for punishment". Like, they keep f*cking with him yet he continues to interact..

Half of it is that, and half of it is that it is standard procedure for contract artists to not be caught standing in a court of law. Nobody wants to hire people who sue.

Re: My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

#57

Post by s_dev »

I would expect this story from a struggling indie game dev startup but ID Games, Zenimax, Mick Gordon and Stratton are all huge players in the game dev industry -- thus this looks bad for the industry as a whole. I was always curious about why the Doom Eternal OST never really showed up on Spotify. This story explains that.

Re: My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

#58

Post by jabroni_salad »

Chris2048 wrote: post #6

A lot of this feels a little "glutton for punishment". Like, they keep f*cking with him yet he continues to interact..

I think it is more of a lobster in the pot situation. Every contractor is used to watching as the business side of an effort fucks everything up and doing their best to deliver despite the best efforts of managers and lawyers everywhere. SOWs not matching the original description? Asking to start work before the ink dries? Actually we dont want to pay for that thing we said we would pay for after all? No b2b transaction goes without at least one of those. In consulting lingo we call it "pricing in some slack" and its a lesson every rookie learns on their first ever contract 100% of the time.

He just didn't notice when it became irredeemable because hey, he's been working with DOOM for decades at this point and it's always worked out.

Re: My full statement regarding DOOM Eternal

#60

Post by blitz_skull »

CoolGuySteve wrote: post #2

Horror stories like this are the main reason I only ever bill by the hour and invoice biweekly. Like, sure, I'll change things to meet requirements but I'm not going to work for free or go without pay for months. It's also much easier to fire bad clients or to stop working when an invoice goes unpaid for too long. The only downside to this approach is when salaried subordinates don't understand this dynamic and rack…

Another alternative to hourly billing is value-based pricing with up-front payments. May not work in every industry, but if a client isn't willing to do that, they're probably not a good-faith client anyway.
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