10Tacle in trouble

http://gamestar.de/specials/reports/1946890/die_10tacle_krise.html

According to this article (in German), 10Tacle is in deep financial troubles, and all their projects, including Totems, might be canceled. Crying or Very sad

Damn, this doesn't sound good at all. I simply loved Outcast and expected a worthy and really innovative follower in Totems.
Hearing this feels just like OC2 being canceled.

You are right - there is a big 10tacle crisis - we have known about this for quite some time, unable to share real news with you. We decided to write our own article about the crisis and publish it. So here you are:

The 10tacle crisis

At first, we’d like to point out that part of the following information is only based on rumors and unofficial sources. We apologize for possible mistakes or incorrect information, thank you for understanding!

What is going on with 10tacle?

They are going through a serious crisis. According to what we know from official sources, back in 2007 everything was okay, but since January 2008 there has been a heavy plunge in 10tacle stocks. From its former high of 14€ the value of the share has dropped down to 2 € and even reached a historical low of less than 1€.

How come? What happened?

Everything started off well with a revolutionary financing plan: They managed to gather more than 14 million through Game Fonds No. 1 and 2. Thus they financed previously released games such as GT-Legends, GTR 2 and Black Buccaneer. By doing so, two main problems evolved:
- on the one hand the released games only sold middle-rate (GTR 2 approx. 30,000; Jack Keane approx. 30,000) or sold badly (games such as Warfront: Truning Point or Panzer Tactics didn‘t even reach the top 100 in Germany)
- on the other hand very expensive games have never been published (e.g. Elveon - it is said to have sucked up more than 10 million € within 4 years and still isn’t anywhere near completion.)

So the overall problem was the company’s great ambition and their pursuit of very specific goals, which they couldn’t achieve. 10tacle spent the last years buying up various studios, however, up until now, most of these studios have failed to successfully release a single game.

The real crisis started in March 2008. Due to the significant drop in stock prices and unpaid accounts of financiers 10tacle couldn’t publish any sales figures for 2007. Hence, the long-time CEO Michele Pes was replaced by the new CEO Joachim Magin, formerly working for Pro7. As a result of the new policy of economic and restructuring measures, 25 % of the employees were made redundant. 10tacle announced that they would henceforth concentrate on the development of the games and pass on marketing and publishing to other companies. The planned acquisition of „The Games Company“ was cancelled.

What does this mean for 10tacle’s current studios and games?

10tacle Slovakia: The “Elveon” studio has been irrevocably closed and all its staff members have been made redundant. According to Pes the developer wasn’t able to offer the demanded quality. Elveon should have been released by mid-2007. Another Studio "Climax" is rumored to take over the developement of "Elveon"

Reakktor Media: The Neocron makers are currently working on the MMO „Black Prophecy“. There haven‘t been any news for months (planned release by the end of 2008).

10tacle Belgium: Rumors say the development of „Totems“ will be 12 months delayed from the intended release date. At the moment there is no information on the situation in Belgium.

Blimey! Games: The GTR makers are working on a „Ferrari“ project. No further news for the time being.

10tacle Asia: They have been working on (an) MMO project(s) for years. So far no release and no news.

10tacle Mobile: Two published mobile games. At least one more under way.

Stormregion: „ Codename Panzers: Cold War “ should have been released by March 2008. Total silence ever since. According to Wikipedia and a message written on Stormregion‘s forum the studio hasn‘t received any money from 10tacle since April. Rumor say that the studio was closed in June. The game „Panzers“ is said to be completed since May, yet it is unsure whether it will ever be released.

So, according to these rumors, two big studios have already been closed and the situation of the others is unsure. The future of big games such as „Totems“ and „Elveon“ is completely unknown.

There is no way to tell whether 10tacle will overcome this financial crisis, the worst is to be expected. At the beginning of July 10tacle started to take new measures. Refunding has been initiated through „convertible bond and recapitalization“. They hope to acquire approx. 6 million € with new shares to ease their precarious financial situation. It is not sure whether this action will turn out to be successful.

10tacle crisis forum discussion

Further links regarding the topic (German only):
10tacle investor relations
Gamestar article
Heise.de article
Krawall.de article

I haven´t got understand this world...

How can have so bad luck - Yves Grolet - and team him?

Will no company take charge of TOTEMS? Already I saw that ELVEON must had been acquired by CLIMAX, this image says everything:

It is supposed that they have retouched the game and it will shine more or less like in the image.

I wait (truly) that some study of those who existed in the event of Leizpig or 'friend' of '10TACLE' encarge of the project, because one sees better and more interesting than ELVEON.

Please do everything possible in order that TOTEMS sees the light, it have sufficient force to there return to the fans of OUTCAST, hope to see something really different.

I understand your feelings cutterslade23.
I won't give up hope so easily, but it looks pretty dark at the moment.
What may help Yves and his studio to survive is that they developed their "NeoReality" engine. Don't know if it is completed by now, but it is the only technology of it's kind 10tacle owns. It would be a shot in their own knee to lose it's creators who are the only one's that can use all it's potential. Concerning Totems, I just don't know. How much of it is completed?
It should be most of it and I doubt any other company like climax can easily take over the project. I don't think any company can handle NeoReality the same way Yves and his team can do. Would be a terrible mistakle in my opinion to not let them finish their work.
Let's wait and see....

Message for 'Messiah'.

EDIT: Ups, I´m wrong in a previous commentary, excuse me.

Let's hope that 10TACLE Studios Belgium says, if is that they can speak about the topic.

Greetings from Spain!

Pd: I was on the verge of buying 'X-Box 360' for TOTEMS, seeing that you make your new web to speak exclusively about mentioned title but I don´t know because I had an evil foreboding... Rolling Eyes

Quote:

Stormregion und Bratislava sind zurzeit geschlossen (Kostengründen)
Man arbeitet mit hochdruck an den Spielen: Tottems, Black Prophecy und Elveon. Alle anderen Spiele sind auf Eis gelegt. Sollte die Kapitalerhöhung erfolgreich durchgeführt werden wird Stormredion wieder eröffnet und andere Projekte realisiert.

Ausserdem wird es einen Mega Deal mit Electronic Arts geben... Munkelt man!!! Das aber sehr laut!!! Vielleicht ist Electronic Arts der Investor im Hintergrund.[...]

I found this message on a wall-street message board by a self proclaimed insider. Of course this is only another rumor, but it makes me hope again. And what we really need now, is faith that 10tacle won't die.
english translation:
Stormregion and Bratislava are closed at the moment (for reasons of economy)
People work very hard on: Totems, Black Prophecy and Elveon. All other projects are on hold. If the recapitalization is successfull Stormregion will be opened again and other projects will be finished.

In addition there will be a big deal with Electronic Arts... Rumored!!! Very loud!!! Maybe Electronic Arts is the investor in the background.[...]

Yeah...

I was afraid of this since the very beginning. Crying or Very sad

10tacle and a game of this scale didn't sound good to me at all. But if what Messiah says is true...

But, whatever happens, I hope Grolet and the rest don't lose their IP again.

[Apr 22, 2008] CLIMAX creating PS3, 360 versions of 'ELVEON

Excuse me, but I copy and paste the message that I put in the forum of 'Off Topic'. Because I think is better this one in this post :

ELVEON Fan-site

Quote:

Climax (who's currently in charge of bringing Viva Pinata to Windows PCs everywhere) may have more in its portfolio that are worth taking a gander at. From its official site, you can tell that Climax has at least two projects lined up for next generation consoles - one of them being Exiles for the Sony PS3 and Microsoft Xbox 360. The other hasn't been named, but doesn't it strike you as being familiar?

That's probably because the Elvish theme is very much like 10tacle Studios' Elveon (PlayStation 3, Windows, Xbox 360).

Yes, Elveon - the same game that we've heard much about back in 2006. The last we've heard of the action RPG was somewhere around early 2007. But fear not; Elveon is far from canceled. It appears that 10tacle Studios had little rough bumps some time ago (its stock dropped from a decent Euro 15 to just Euro 2 per) and was forced to lay off much of its work force.

One of its studios in Bratislava, the same studio in charge of Elveon's development, was also forced to close up shop. You would've thought that the project ended right there, but it has been handed over to Climax Group in a collaborative development effort. And they'll be using Unreal Engine 3.0 and SpeedTree middleware to deliver the game to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Info on who's responsible for the PC version is nowhere to be found, but it's likely 10tacle Studios' remaining branches will handle that branch of development.

We're not sure what effects the developer change would have for the Elven RPG, but we've learned that 10tacle Studios said there will be a completely "new gameplay system." They plan to roll out new updates in the coming months, so keep your eyes glued to this space.

Font

At least something good has had 10TACLE Studios and it has been to liberate ELVEON in order that another company takes charge of his accomplishment (and not as ATARI/INFOGRAMES with OUTCAST Sad

).

What engine graph used originally ELVEON?

On the other side I think that as fans, could to communicate with other editors who should not have titles of this type. For example we might not with EA (Mirros's Edge) and UBISOFT (Assassin's Creed), though this one for seeing this EA's rumor (I hope really that they invert).

Probably 'Microsoft' is interested in a game of these characteristics and normally it is in the habit of leaving freedom to his studies to do the game that they want, while they innovate.

If I myself could speak better english would launch a campaign of advertising to encourage the publishers/editors in inverting in this title of the creators of OUTCAST, always it is a good claim to speak about his better game. Though if you have an idea and you give me the texts in english, I can try to do something in flash, to call more the attention, since advertising has not had TOTEMS great ... Why we not to give it to him (TOTEMS)?

I hope for your answers.

Ah there is one article that speaks about the web of TOTEMS (this one in German, I believe): Link
¿Could be it translate to english?

Greetings from Spain!

Of course there are possible actions we can take as fans like a petition for Totems etc.
But I think at the current stage we should not do this. Let's wait for any official news.
It wouldn't make sense to promote Totems to other publishers without exactly knowng if Totems will need one. Maybe 10tacle is making it after all and growing again...

The link you've posted is an old news from oktoNet, a german promotion company, with handles Totems promotion issues. I'll tranlsate the important facts for you:
-oktoNet is in charge of creating the Totems Teaser- and Productwebsite.
-oktoNet is in charge of handling the Totems community (haha funny - I think we do a better work here)
-oktoNet was hired to do this "full-service"
-the Teaser site was created to be very mystic like the final game, story parts are slowly revealed
-unusual marketing campaign: important journalists got a wooden box with a feather in it and the Totems web-adress Wink

-Part III of the site was released in September. Part IV will be released early 2008(which turned out to be untrue)
-the man in charge is Devrim Yalcin