Has Michael Unsworth left Rockstar Games?

[Jason]

3 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

This said I do feel the staff have come across as a bit heavy handed in their responses in this thread - quite likely with the best of intentions, but nevertheless I think it’s worth trying to explain what this is like from the other point of view.

 

What I will say is there's been multiple posts, including from your self, where you've mentioned (to paraphrase) that this is a forum and people are allowed to discuss things, which is absolutely true. I've not told anyone to shut up, I've discussed the same topic as everybody else and have written out also why I think what I think and yet I'm being given the exact same speech, with personal attacks, that I've been accused of giving, without personal attacks.

 

This is precisely what I mean by my frustration at times with how discussion around news such as this goes on this forum. It is not exclusive to staff, so the usage of staff here is irrelevant (and all my posts are my own opinions, which I'm always happy to discuss in detail with anyone, there's no GTAF motto we have to follow, lol), but on here, in this community, when something that could be perceived negatively happens the response to anyone that doesn't come out with a pitchfork is to label those people as shills or otherwise accuse them of "toxic positivity". That's just... not right.

 

I just went back and looked, speaking for my self I made one post on the "fearmongering" between the thread being made and your first post, every else was a discussion on stuff like controls and what could actually change w/ their games with new people in charge. While I do understand what you're saying at this point it feels like a bit of a mountain out of a mole hill. It feels to me that the whole thing has become "heavy handed" because people are wanting to pick fights more than anything else.

 

4 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

We get the constant use of words such as “fear-mongering”, and that is going to sound - even if not intended - like it’s belittling peoples opinions when they feel concerned about recent developments. Yes, there may be some of that out there, but from what I have seen the vast majority of posts in this thread simply to do fall in to that category. Unless you are ultra specific about which comments you’re referring to when an emotive word like that is used, people are going to suspect it’s directed at them if their opinion is vaguely similar to the one you are dismissing.

 

I mean I've clarified multiple times about my own personal usage of fear mongering in regards to this discussion, I have also said it was more a response to early posts in the thread which have mostly been hidden. The discussion then moved on to a few other topics and was only circled back onto said topic later by yourself and Sneaky. There was little to no beating down or dismissing of opinions beyond what was said early on (and again, deleted but for example a troll came in and used the "woke" word for why he left).

[Spider-Vice]

1 hour ago, Jason said:

There was little to no beating down or dismissing of opinions beyond what was said early on (and again, deleted but for example a troll came in and used the "woke" word for why he left).

And again as I've said before, those handful of removed posts (and the only ones in this thread) were because this one person you mentioned started gong on a major off-topic frustrated rant about The Last of Us Part II as a game (calling it "woke", going on about its show of feminism, etc), completely unprompted, just because I and a couple others mentioned Neil Druckmann in the first or second page. Which as you can imagine has nothing to do with Michael Unsworth leaving R* Games lol.

Edited September 1, 2023 by Spider-Vice

[Jimbatron]

Thanks for the detailed response @Jason

 

Hopefully my previous post did indicate I was at least dimly aware of frustrations.

 

A personal digression in the spoiler:

 

Spoiler

Since you don’t know me at all - I’ll explain a personality trait I have that may put some context on your mountain out of a molehill remark. For better or worse, I am fundamentally wired in a way where I find it very difficult to just to look at a situation of conflict or a problem just in the here and now. I cannot stop myself forecasting forward about how it might develop if left unchecked. Some people say that means I make mountains out of molehills. I’d argue with that perspective you ensure that todays molehill never becomes tomorrows mountain. So - I’m not dismissing your interpretation of my comments magnitude to the here and now, more explaining why I think there may be different perspectives on the same analysis.

 

I’d also just through in one last analytical thought. Todays world is busy - we all have so many connections via the internet to different people and topics. That means that we often have less time to write and read things that we look. Perhaps in both directions there is a bit of this leading to more misunderstanding than there would be otherwise.

 

I won’t drag on my monologues much further, but I’ll try an approach to see if we can get a consensus on definitions by example, and hopefully suggest we might agree that we are all in camp 2 or 3 below (and either is a respectable stance to take):

 

1) Fear-mongering:

“It’s all going to the dogs! GTA VI’s story will be crap and GTA VI won’t even have one”

 

2) Valid Concern:

”We’re losing a lot of top talent and leadership matters. I’m sure future GTA’s will still be great but does it mean we won’t get stories as epic as we’ve enjoyed in the last 15 years?”

 

3) Valid positivity:

”Yes these guys did a great job running the show but this day was always going to come. You’d expect these have known they will have been leaving for a while and succession plans will be ready - and with the long release cycles, there is time for new leadership to bed in.

 

4) Toxic positivity:

“The next R* title will always be better than the last, these developments don’t matter at all and anyone who says otherwise is an idiot.”

[Spider-Vice]

3 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

4) Toxic positivity:

“The next R* title will always be better than the last, these developments don’t matter at all and anyone who says otherwise is an idiot.”

Literally none of us said this though... You will not see any posts from me or Jason here calling anyone "idiots" for having valid concerns. In fact, this is what happened mostly, and you're correctly calling it "valid positivity".

 

3 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

3) Valid positivity:

”Yes these guys did a great job running the show but this day was always going to come. You’d expect these have known they will have been leaving for a while and succession plans will be ready - and with the long release cycles, there is time for new leadership to bed in.

[Jason]

5 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

A personal digression in the spoiler:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Since you don’t know me at all - I’ll explain a personality trait I have that may put some context on your mountain out of a molehill remark. For better or worse, I am fundamentally wired in a way where I find it very difficult to just to look at a situation of conflict or a problem just in the here and now. I cannot stop myself forecasting forward about how it might develop if left unchecked. Some people say that means I make mountains out of molehills. I’d argue with that perspective you ensure that todays molehill never becomes tomorrows mountain. So - I’m not dismissing your interpretation of my comments magnitude to the here and now, more explaining why I think there may be different perspectives on the same analysis.

 

For me, I'm extremely laid back. I have the patience of a saint on most things. That might explain my outlook on things like this.

[Jimbatron]

43 minutes ago, Spider-Vice said:

Literally none of us said this though... You will not see any posts from me or Jason here calling anyone "idiots" for having valid concerns. In fact, this is what happened mostly, and you're correctly calling it "valid positivity".

 

 

I think I may have not made the most important bit of my post above stand out enough:

 

46 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

hopefully suggest we might agree that we are all in camp 2 or 3 below (and either is a respectable stance to take):

 

If my own language was too suggestive I thought you guys were definitely in camp 4 (toxic positivity) then my apologies. And I don't have any criticism of you guys or anyone taking the more optimistic slant of camp 3 (valid positivity) from a point of principle, even though I'm far more cautious about what these developments mean for the long term. [EDIT - to put it another way, the 1) and 4) examples are put in there intended to show what we are not, and by use of contrast empahsise what we are]

 

But would you guys do us the similar courtesy of explicitly acknowledging we're in camp 2 (valid concern), not camp 1 (fearmongering), and that it isn't an unreasonable position to take, even if you disagree with it? I get there's been a some suggestion that a lot of the more emotive language was in fact directed are removed posts, but it's been a bit more indirect than I would have liked.

Edited September 1, 2023 by Jimbatron

[Jason]

Just now, Jimbatron said:

But would you guys do us the similar courtesy of explicitly acknowledging we're in camp 2 (valid concern), not camp 1 (fearmongering)

 

You didn't fearmonger. Again, both my self and Spider were talking about people fearmongering why Urnsworth may have left. That is a line of speculation I think is personally none of our business, as it could be for a whole lot of reasons many of which could be personal.

 

I've said my self numerous times now that there could well be an impact from Urnsworth leaving, he's a writer, it's likely gonna have some sort of impact. Again on that particular topic my personal stance is that 1) it's a slippery slope of things to worry about because turn over and retirements are inevitable but also cause 2) the impact won't be felt by us for several years. That's my opinion that was part of the discussion, just like yours was.

[Spider-Vice]

10 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

But would you guys do us the similar courtesy of explicitly acknowledging we're in camp 2 (valid concern), not camp 1 (fearmongering), and that it isn't an unreasonable position to take, even if you disagree with it? I get there's been a some suggestion that a lot of the more emotive language was in fact directed are removed posts, but it's been a bit more indirect than I would have liked.

What Jason said above.  In fact I will quote my *only* mention of the word "fearmongering" in this thread (search results here), which is directly relating to the reasons *why* he left. My point was that it's fearmongering to imply that the *only* reason that Michael Unsworth left is due to friction or tension at the company, because a lot of people leave their jobs completely peacefully due to retirement or any other reason. Such as a mixture of being there for a long time, and their work being done, whilst still being in a fine relationship with the company.

You may not agree with the rest of my post and that's totally fine of course, but I never said that people were fearmongering in general, just about thinking that the only reasons he left are negative, when that might not be the case, and it's not the only possible case. I hope we can put this discussion to bed as much as possible.

 

On 8/27/2023 at 2:46 PM, Spider-Vice said:

Seriously it's full-on fearmongering to think that the ONLY reason is that there's friction. It's been years between veteran departures, they are all already of a certain age. In this day and age a lot of devs join AAA studios only to work on ONE project because development times are so long and development is so stressful. One game is enough to burn out a lot of people nowadays. It is completely normal. 16 years is almost triple the normal amount of tenure for someone in the games industry, average tenure is about 5-7 years and even then that's kinda high. AAA development is tiring, stressful and complex and many industry veterans just wanna leave that behind now after 15-20 years doing the same thing - this includes narrative and R* isn't that special, they will have people who want to just retire or do something different after so long.

[Jimbatron]

1 minute ago, Jason said:

 

You didn't fearmonger.

Thanks, and although I sort of implied above, there is arguably a nice circular proof now that we are respectively taking positions of valid caution and valid positivity. Because if we were in more extreme camps, we couldn't reach the point where we say the other persons position is respectable, even if we don't completely agree.

 

It's gone round the houses a bit I know but I think the comment I made above about none of us having enough time to write and read thoroughly may have a lot to do with it.

[Sneaky Queeky]

5 hours ago, Jason said:

 

Having just seen your posts about your health I do wanna say that the comment was absolutely not anything to do with that and I absolutely do wish you the best there. Internet fisty cuffs and sparring matches mean nothing when it comes to health. My full apologies if it came off as insincere.

 

 

To speak plainly my self, this criticism tends to come from people who don't read very well, or just otherwise twist or ignore what I have said.

 

That's a strong thing to say but basically something I've long noticed is that unless I come out and go "f*ck R*" or otherwise add something bluntly negative to my opinion then it's taken as defending or some sort of "hostile positivity". There are different ways to handle change, express concern or otherwise simply express your opinion but far too often on this forum you criticised for not coming out swinging. Multiple times on matters where R*/T2 have f*cked up and have I straight up criticised them for it while at the same time openly discussed what was going on have I been met with posts claiming I'm some sort of shill when, looking at my own words, I can see exactly where I've blatantly agreed with the general community consensus and criticism, I'm just holding a pitchfork. Being told I'm saying X when I've actually said Y is a frustrating thing to say the least, I'm sure anyone can agree w/ that.

 

As I said on this particular matter, R* will be impacted by people leaving but I personally don't think it's something that we should be stressing too much about right now for reasons I've stated. I have explained this every time, and haven't simply come in and gone "all you moaners are wrong, it'll all be fine". Come RDR3 or whatever is next following VI I'm sure we'll all be here discussing the writing and the impact the loss of people have had.

Thank you regarding my health. I got hit by testicular cancer and emphysema the same month. I'm the right age for the cancer (36) but apparently young for the lung disease. Had the removal and everything, the cancer didn't spread. 

 

But I want to apologize to the forum for my attitude last night and injecting myself into everything instead of just sticking to the topic. That was classless of me. I picked a hill to die on, and man, did I die.

 

I'm just very frustrated at the loss of talent and I think they are significant losses; it's mainly down to my belief that Rockstar have always had a unique style to their writing and overall tone that other video game developers don't share. I find games like the Assassin Creed series, or Bethesda's games, for instance, extremely dry, and though I play and enjoy those games, the fun I get from them is not quite the same. I can replay GTA/RDR so many times where with other games I am done after one playthrough. 

 

And I personally believe so much of that style is down to many of the creative leads over the years, going as far back to the DMA era, many who are now gone, but were there for most of the glory days from GTA 3 onwards. 

 

I think Lazlow, for instance, though an annoying on screen character, had such a huge impact on the game's satire, owing to his background in radio and advertisement. He came up with so much of the brand names in game and a lot of the NPC dialogue we hear while roaming the worlds Rockstar created.  I remember him on his own podcast/radio (Or maybe Opie and Anthony) talking about how he had been busy writing all the theater shows and newspapers for RDR 1, so I'm guessing he did the same for RDR 2

 

But the truth is, of course, change is inevitable. But I do think it's significant change and should be acknowledged and some caution at the future isn't a bad thing.  So many fans have been disappointed with recent remasters and the long wait for GTA VI and the focus on Online, the company becoming more "corporate," but these things don't actually bother me as much I worry about the tone of the next big GTA and RDR not being of the same style, or changing in a drastic way I don't enjoy. But that remains to be seen. 

 

 

Mostly I was disappointed by Spider's response which included "So what?" and that us having any attachment to the particular writers/authors as "this Internet thing," which I found highly dismissive, especially considering art/literature is thousands of years older than the internet.  But I should have responded to him directly instead of getting on my high horse and criticizing the whole forum. 

[Spider-Vice]

21 minutes ago, Sneaky Queeky said:

Mostly I was disappointed by Spider's response which included "So what?"

I'm sorry that frustrated you, but the "so what" was not dismissing any valid concerns directly, but instead a personal opinion about auteur theory which you obviously don't have to agree with, that's fine! That specific post was going over the idolisation of specific creatives like it happens many times in the entertainment industry, not even specific to Rockstar (!), where people think that one creator moves the entire team and defines an entire (game/film/show) when that's not quite true. It can be frustrating to see people dismiss entire projects over one creative leaving. Yes, things may change, but they also may not change much. At the end of the day it's a personal opinion!

 

The point being made, that perhaps could have been written a bit differently, is that Michael leaving doesn't necessarily mean that others (such as Roger Drew who was highlighted earlier) can't carry the torch, because at the end of the day Michael wasn't the only one, and we still have Rupert Humphries for example. And even when Dan Houser was around he didn't work alone. But again you don't have to agree at all, this is a forum after all, people are gonna have all kinds of different views.

 

You're free to disagree *obviously*, but last night's post was certainly an overreaction. But of course thanks for acknowledging it and coming back with a clear head.  For what it's worth, I'm terribly sorry about your health issues and I wish you all the best - an argument in a forum is a completely separate thing from any real personal issues.

Edited September 1, 2023 by Spider-Vice
companies -> projects

[VitoSpeed]

So can we know for sure that he has left Rockstar?

[Ballbreaker_]

Just now, VitoSpeed said:

So can we know for sure that he has left Rockstar?

 

Yeah, I was about to ask the same thing. All this drama and we don't even know if the guy actually left or not.

[.Smaher.]

No, we cannot 

[Sneaky Queeky]

2 hours ago, Jason said:

 

You didn't fearmonger. Again, both my self and Spider were talking about people fearmongering why Urnsworth may have left. That is a line of speculation I think is personally none of our business, as it could be for a whole lot of reasons many of which could be personal.

I completely agree with this; I don't care why anyone has left and I don't like any silly speculation about some inside soap opera with the higher ups and that kind of talk gets us nowhere and is, as you said, none of our business. Unfortunately I think some of the dirty laundry being aired after Leslie Benzies' departure fueled that kind of pointless speculation. 

[Sneaky Queeky]

16 minutes ago, Spider-Vice said:

I'm sorry that frustrated you, but the "so what" was not dismissing any valid concerns directly, but instead a personal opinion about auteur theory which you obviously don't have to agree with, that's fine! That specific post was going over the idolisation of specific creatives like it happens many times in the entertainment industry, not even specific to Rockstar (!), where people think that one creator moves the entire team and defines an entire (game/film/show) when that's not quite true. It can be frustrating to see people dismiss entire companies over one creative leaving. Yes, things may change, but they also may not change much. At the end of the day it's a personal opinion!

 

The point being made, that perhaps could have been written a bit differently, is that Michael leaving doesn't necessarily mean that others (such as Roger Drew who was highlighted earlier) can't carry the torch, because at the end of the day Michael wasn't the only one, and we still have Rupert Humphries for example. And even when Dan Houser was around he didn't work alone. But again you don't have to agree at all, this is a forum after all, people are gonna have all kinds of different views.

 

You're free to disagree *obviously*, but last night's post was certainly an overreaction. But of course thanks for acknowledging it and coming back with a clear head.  For what it's worth, I'm terribly sorry about your health issues and I wish you all the best - an argument in a forum is a completely separate thing from any real personal issues.

I appreciate your response, truly. I appreciate your explanation. I really shouldn't have mentioned my health in one of my posts, I don't want to appear that I'm trying to get sympathy. 

 

In all honestly this is the only board I post on lately. It sounds pretty boring, but I don't really view other message boards these days and I never got into reddit or discord, and I don't spend that much time on the internet now, I just like reading the news and this forum every few days. 

 

I still stand by, in general, my overall point in this thread, but I sincerely regret my silly posts in the Roger Clark interview thread, feel free to remove them or hide them, whatever. It just gives you more work to do I guess 

[sanjay3207]

59 minutes ago, Sneaky Queeky said:

Thank you regarding my health. I got hit by testicular cancer and emphysema the same month. I'm the right age for the cancer (36) but apparently young for the lung disease. Had the removal and everything, the cancer didn't spread. 

Hope you are doing good man.

 

59 minutes ago, Sneaky Queeky said:

I'm just very frustrated at the loss of talent and I think they are significant losses; it's mainly down to my belief that Rockstar have always had a unique style to their writing and overall tone that other video game developers don't share.

Let's hope that the loss of talent is replaced by good talent and the reins is passed to good writers who have been working under dan houser, michael unsworth and rupert humphries. As a sign of passing the reins to good writers, Rockstar did hire roger drew who worked with renowned satirists like Armando Iannucci and jesse armstrong [Sucession Series executive producer]. Roger drew did write a lot of radio stuff from 1995 - 2008 and did some television stuff from 1995 till now. If he indeed writes the radio chatter in GTA 6, it will indeed fell different considering his british background whereas lazlow was american. 

 

59 minutes ago, Sneaky Queeky said:

I worry about the tone of the next big GTA and RDR not being of the same style

I think the game will be tonally different. Like I mentioned in my previous post, Paul kurowski and james worral wrote GTA 3, GTA VC and GTA SA left rockstar after GTA SA's developement. Even with dan houser being as the VP of creative, there was a drastic tonal difference between GTA SA and GTA 4. The departure of Dan houser and michael unsworth will definitely impact GTA 6. Whether it will be positive or negative, we don't know. My positivity towards GTA 6 comes from the fact that Rockstar hiring roger drew who has 20 years experience writing satirical stuff, Which kinda shows that they still do care about writing quality, they could have hired someone else, But they went out and hired good writer with reputable experience. Another thing about rockstar is that they have managed to change very well in the past. The transition from GTA SA to GTA 4. Even though there was tonal change, The writing quality went from strength to strength [Atleast imo]. I was concerned when leslie benzies left rockstar, But rockstar filled leslie's positions right away i.e, Aaron garbut and rob nelson filled leslie's position and under their leadership we got RDR 2. I am still kinda down that dan houser and michael unsworth left. We got RDR 2 under their writing leadership. Would have been cool if they were still at rockstar and lead the writing team. But, I am still kinda hopeful that rockstar still got it considering some of the leadership that worked on RDR 2 are still working there. 

 

59 minutes ago, Sneaky Queeky said:

I remember him on his own podcast/radio (Or maybe Opie and Anthony) talking about how he had been busy writing all the theater shows and newspapers for RDR 1, so I'm guessing he did the same for RDR 2

Lazlow and his team completely wrote the theatre shows and newspapers in RDR2. He has been credited as writing for theatre and he was head of audio department at rockstar and as well as he was credited as audio director. 

 

All of this back on forth talk reminds me of this arthur morgan quote

 

"Is anybody still working? The whole goddamn place full of people bickering, and fighting, and lying. It makes me real sad." 

I wouldn't say that we have been fighting and lying but, Hopefully you get the point. 

 

Hope that this gta 6 reveal unites the fanbase, There has been a lot of split in the fanbase. Hopefully the fanbase can come together and can be excited for gta 6.

Edited September 1, 2023 by sanjay3207

[.Smaher.]

I feel like people are pretending like Unsworth (possibly) leaving will have immediate consequences to GTA 6, as if the game hasn’t already been written while we knew he was there. If he left, this should affect the next GTA game’s writing, not GTA 6. 

[Ballbreaker_]

4 hours ago, .Smaher. said:

I feel like people are pretending like Unsworth (possibly) leaving will have immediate consequences to GTA 6, as if the game hasn’t already been written while we knew he was there. If he left, this should affect the next GTA game’s writing, not GTA 6. 

 

No one can say that for sure. We don't know much (or maybe nothing) about the development process, exactly which people are involved (or the extention of their involvement) and since when. Guys like Dan, Lazlow and even Michael simply don't leave the company overnight, or start the production of a game with such big scale only to abandon it halfway through. 

 

The release of GTA VI could bring some of these questions into the light and a better understanding of the whole situation would unfold. Right now we're just on speculation territory and all guesses are just... guesses.

 

Just to remember, there are reports of the game being on early development stages as of 2020 (by Jason Schreier, basically). The release date might be very far, with much work still to be done.

Edited September 1, 2023 by FamousActor_

[Zapper]

9 minutes ago, FamousActor_ said:

Just to remember, there are reports of the game being on early development stages as of 2020 (by Jason Schreier, basically). The release date might be very far, with much work still to be done.

 

Nope. People grossly misinterpreted that phrase. In 2020, VI was early—in full production. Schreier himself expected the game to come out by late 2022-'23 before the pandemic changed everything.

 

Plus, in his 2022 Bloomberg article on R*, he said that VI had been in some form of production since 2014, which makes complete sense. Pre-production started around that time, and proper full production started after or close to when RDR2 was finished.

[uNi]

15 hours ago, Sneaky Queeky said:

I really shouldn't have mentioned my health in one of my posts, I don't want to appear that I'm trying to get sympathy. 

 

In all honestly this is the only board I post on lately. It sounds pretty boring, but I don't really view other message boards these days and I never got into reddit or discord, and I don't spend that much time on the internet now, I just like reading the news and this forum every few days. 

 

For what it matters, if coming here and vent out a bit about stuff helps you, you're more than welcome to do so.

[Jimbatron]

Just adding some general thoughts about the industry phenomenon of burn out and a whole crop of big names who a reaching the possibility of (early) retirement, going off to do something different etc.

 

Obviously it’s inevitable these guys won’t go on for ever. The question is how you manage the transition effectively when they do eventually move on.

 

I think one thing in favour of R* is their ultra long development cycles, and that potentially gives more time for new people in leadership roles to bed in.

 

What do I mean by that? Speaking from my own perspective, when I start a new role I always feel a bit less effective to begin with. You’ve got to learn how the company works, get used to its culture and know where everything is. And this gets exaggerated the more senior you become. This is simply because you tend to have more people in the food chain under you and you have to get to know them as individuals, learn what their strengths and weaknesses are and adapt your approach to get the best out of them. In my last job move, I felt I added value in year one, but I didn’t feel like I’d reached full effectiveness in roll until year 2.

 

The advantage here for R* is that if they have (let’s be generous) a 5 year project length, then a new leader bedding in is only 20% of the time. So it’s easier to absorb that and play catch up later, than let’s say if you release a new title every two years, and the bedding in time is half of your project length.

 

But it’s still a concern. A very different industry I know but you really want to avoid the Man Utd Scenario of bad timing where you lose too many big hitters at once. Rumour has it Alex Ferguson sat down and confided in David Gill he and planned to leave at the end of the season - and Gill basically said “oh 5h1t, I was planning the same” or words to that effect. (Fairly certain that’s roughly what happened - I’m not a Utd fan so stand ready to be corrected). Utd still aren’t close to getting back to their old strength, but arguably it would have been easier for them if they hadn’t lost two key people at the same time.

 

If I were Strauss and/or Sam, I would basically give Humphries whatever he wanted (within reason) just to give a bit of continuity. I think then if you need two find replacements for DH and MU (again, assuming he is leaving), I’d try to get one new person from the outside, and the other role promote from within. Then you get a good balance of continuity and new input, which with Roger Drew coming in, this may indeed be the thinking.

 

What is really be tempted to do, is if these senior guys want to move on, say because they’re burnt out, want to spend more time with their family, I’d make it very attractive for them to stay on a couple of days a week as consultants to help aid the transition. This allows a gradually ramp down, and supports new leadership as they bed in. Of course, it’s not impossible they already did this with DH for example and we just weren’t told he ramped down more gradually (in addition to a long notice period).

 

But that brings me to a final point around communication, and I think Take2 could do better here. If I were SZ, I’d want to get an arrangement like the above in place and then say very openly “yes X is leaving, I know that may cause some concern as they are a titan of the industry. However X has been very concerned about ensuring we have a strong transition plan to protect the legacy they’ve helped to build. This has been planned for many months and they have been working closely with Y (insert CV of new person), and we are all confident we’re in a great place to continue to deliver the quality our customers have come to expect and build on it further. We’d like to thank X for the huge contribution they’ve made over the years, and helping to set us up for future success.”

 

Obviously you’ve got to have the individual who is leaving onboard with that but if you can do it, I think it’s massively more reassuring to investors and fans alike. Communication isn’t their strong point though imho. That kind of “say very little” was common 20 years ago, but people expect more openness these days.

[sanjay3207]

53 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

But that brings me to a final point around communication, and I think Take2 could do better here. If I were SZ, I’d want to get an arrangement like the above in place and then say very openly “yes X is leaving, I know that may cause some concern as they are a titan of the industry. However X has been very concerned about ensuring we have a strong transition plan to protect the legacy they’ve helped to build. This has been planned for many months and they have been working closely with Y (insert CV of new person), and we are all confident we’re in a great place to continue to deliver the quality our customers have come to expect and build on it further. We’d like to thank X for the huge contribution they’ve made over the years, and helping to set us up for future success.”

I agree with most of your comment, But this communication passage wouldn't go down very well in the community. People will interpret this as damage control. The passage's aim might be to deliver that. "Yeah, this has been planned for months and we are already have suitable replacement for that position." But, what people would interpret is that "Yeah, things are bad, If things were good why are they coming out and saying that things are good". 

 

A recent example of this is the recent halo/343 debacle. After microsoft hit 343 with many layoffs, 343 released a statement saying "Halo is here to say and in the future we will build great halo experience in the future for halo fans." People in the comments were saying that this is bad for the company when they are coming out and saying that everything is fine. 

 

 

53 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

X for the huge contribution they’ve made over the years, and helping to set us up for future success.

 

T2 did make a comment about dan houser when he left. 

 

This is from their SEC filing  - 

After an extended break beginning in the spring of 2019, Dan Houser, Vice President, Creative at Rockstar Games, will be leaving the company. Dan Houser’s last day will be March 11, 2020. We are extremely grateful for his contributions. Rockstar Games has built some of the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful game worlds, a global community of passionate fans and an incredibly talented team, which remains focused on current and future projects.

 

https://ir.take2games.com/node/26571/html

 

This is from Washington post  - 

“After an extended break beginning in the spring of 2019, Dan Houser, Vice President, Creative at Rockstar Games, will be leaving the company,” reads a short statement in the SEC filing. “We are extremely grateful for his contributions.”

A Rockstar spokeperson confirmed the news and declined to comment further, except to clarify that Sam Houser’s role as president in Rockstar, which he founded in 1998, remains unchanged.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/02/04/dan-houser-co-founder-rockstar-games-is-leaving-studio-behind-grand-theft-auto-red-dead-redemption/

 

53 minutes ago, Jimbatron said:

If I were Strauss and/or Sam, I would basically give Humphries whatever he wanted (within reason) just to give a bit of continuity. I think then if you need two find replacements for DH and MU (again, assuming he is leaving), I’d try to get one new person from the outside, and the other role promote from within. Then you get a good balance of continuity and new input, which with Roger Drew coming in, this may indeed be the thinking.

I wouldn't be surprised if they have writers who have been working under rockstar promoted when dan houser left. When dan was VP of creative, Michael was senior creative writer. When dan left rockstar, Michael unsworth was promoted to VP of writing and Humphries was VP of Narrative. Luke turton and roger drew are credited as Senior Creative Writers. There are other 20-30 who are credited as dialogue research, dialogue producer and senior research writer. Some have been working at rockstar since 2005 some joined before gta 5 and some only worked on RDR 2.

 

Since dan departure's, nobody has filled that position. We still don't know who is VP of creative is? Someone said that sam houser went to london and purchased a house there. Because london seems to be the place where writers are there. Do you guys think sam houser took that position and will be both creative and executive producer for GTA 6 ?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 2, 2023 by sanjay3207

[Jimbatron]

@sanjay3207 the DH thing though “been on an extended break” I read as simply he’d been on a sabbatical and then not come back. It’s not quite what I mean where he’d gradually ramp down his time to oversee a transition. Which I get isn’t always possible but is the ideal I’d be aiming for if I were mgt at T2.

[sanjay3207]

I don't think there was a gradual transision. Once dan houser left, Rockstar probably alloted his duties to michael unsworth or rupert humphires and it must have taken some time adjust to michael or rupert's leadership. 

 

I think we will know who took up dan's role when gta 6's marketing takes place. There will be some articles from rockstar games. Rob nelson, dan houser and michael unsworth did some interviews for rdr 2.

[Kris194]

I've been on a vacation for two weeks and first thing I'm reading is this, not good. If he really left then it should be really clear by now, that Rockstar is bleeding or maybe even falling apart. At the same time I can't really say, that I'm surprised. Larian's CEO after they recently released BG3 mentioned, that they have absolutely no will right now to spend another six years on one project, they want to make something smaller now. It will get only worse if leadership in game dev companies won't have a change of mind about going back to making again smaller projects.

Edited September 2, 2023 by Kris194

[SpiderVice_Sucks]

He updated his LinkedIn profile picture, the rest of his profile is the same. I really think that he left the company according to his description and experience. If he didn't leave he would've get another role then and it wouldn't be just written "Vice President of Writing 2021-2023"

Also his description just says Writer. I have checked other profiles and they have written "(Role) at (company)" not just "(Role)" as in his profile

Edited September 4, 2023 by ionutx02

[sanjay3207]

2 minutes ago, ionutx02 said:

He updated his LinkedIn profile picture, the rest of his profile is the same. I really think that he left the company according to his description and experience. If he didn't leave he would've get another role then and it wouldn't be just written "Vice President of Writing 2021-2023"

 

Yep, This confirms it . He did leave and we can confirm his departure. Also his connections increased to 30 to 51. 

 

I am really thankful for the stories and lines he wrote for rockstar and bringing the compelling characters and stories to the screen. All the best for his future endeavors and excited for what he will do next.

[Kris194]

Two out of three writers who wrote RDRII story seem to be gone, people who say, that it won't affect Rockstar must be crazy.

[SpiderVice_Sucks]

5 minutes ago, Kris194 said:

Two out of three writers who wrote RDRII story seem to be gone, people who say, that it won't affect Rockstar must be crazy.

It will definetely affect Rockstar, it's impossible for them to hire better writers or at least the same quality. They will also become woke! The studio will be closed like Volition.