Author Topic: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement  (Read 26401 times)

Agent 12

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The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« on: May 27, 2009, 08:44:57 pm »
Hello Everyone,

First off to ease the tension you can watch the first two YouTube videos of the announcement here and here. Future videos will be released under the YouTube username CEMemorial.

If you haven't been here since the C&D please read some of the informative posts below me which clear up some common misconceptions about Crimson Echoes.

I know it has been awhile since the last update, unfortunately the wait wasn't as productive as I had hoped for. It's time to fill everyone in on what has happened since we received the C&D.

On May 8th we received a C&D from Square Enix. The following Monday I managed to talk to a lawyer at their NA headquarters. We talked for awhile but it was very unproductive. He is very good at his job and it was quite obvious that I wouldn't get any information out of him (all of his responses were less than 3 words). The only part of the conversation I was happy with was that I agreed to not update the site about the conversation if they would give me some sort of official response to this whole fiasco. I was happy with this because at the time several people thought we were making up the story and an official response would prove it was legit and also just be awesome. Since talking to the lawyer I have been in contact with PR rep from their NA office asking for said update. I regret to inform everyone that yesterday Square Enix backed out from releasing an official response.

I'm not sure if this was some sort of low tactic by them to wait for the story to die down or if everything is just badly organized over there, but I'm really really angry about this. I wasn't deluding myself into thinking that they were going to drop the C&D but I did think they would give a more PR friendly response to the game something as simple as "thanks for supporting the franchise but we are legally obliged to make you stop developing this game" would have made me happy.  Now the only response Square Enix gave to what might quite possibly be their most devoted fans was a poorly worded "legalese" speak C&D.

I realize that a significant portion of the internet is wearing tin foil hats and believes that we are making this up. There isn't much I can do to dissuade them, I have decided not to release the email/name of the person I was talking to. I'm not sure how influential she was in the decision but in case she is innocent I don't want to completely obliterate her mailbox. I might later release the emails themselves with personal data blacked out.

There is some good news though. Today I am proud to announce the "The Month That Could Have Been" feature. Hopefully by now you have seen Faustwolf's amazing trailers for the game. These trailers were able to be made because FW recorded his play through. Over the last couple weeks we have worked with him to add some director commentary to these videos and will be releasing them throughout the month of June as they are completed. I want to make one thing very clear: These videos were created during beta testing of the game, this is not the final product, and all copies of Crimson Echoes have been destroyed.

I encourage everyone to spread these videos to the far reaches of the internet. This is the final remnants of several years of work by several people across the globe (literally). We hope these videos will accomplish a few goals:
   a) show that we actually did have an almost complete game
   b) Hopefully people will say we aren't faking this (why would we fake a C&D if we had an almost complete game)
   c) Let people know the plot that we have developed


In other news, we have banned two IP addresses associated with longtime Compendium member Dark Serge, who was in perfectly good standing until he made an alt account called "Alienat0r" over at Kagero Studios and proceeded to claim himself perpetrator of a denunciation email laced with false information about Crimson Echoes. Special thanks goes to new Compendium member kattrali for spearheading the investigation of Alienat0r and gathering the evidence that ultimately led us to uncover him.

We continue to hold that the denunciation email purportedly sent to Square Enix constituted a ridiculous attention grab and that even if it was real, it had little bearing on Square Enix's ultimate decision to C&D Compendium fan projects. However, we understand that fan project teams operating in other communities may wish to be on the lookout for this character. For that reason we are providing a list of his various aliases. However, bear in mind that he may use different aliases in the future now that these have been discovered and outed:

Robbert Bruggeman
justrob
Bridgeman
CyrilCyberpunk
Alienat0r
Hellspawns
Dark Serge

The fact that Mr. Bruggeman incompletely blanked out his name in the denunciation email shown at Kagero does nothing to dissolve our suspicions that this was a hoax and that he was, in fact, interested in being caught for the attention that would likely ensue.

As usual I will spend the next couple days trying to answer any questions that anyone may have across the internet.

--JP
« Last Edit: May 27, 2009, 10:18:30 pm by Chrono'99 »


RySenkari

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #2 on: May 27, 2009, 08:57:52 pm »
So, this is it then.

Well, it'll be nice to watch the videos... nice and extremely sad :( :( :(

I guess in the future, whoever wants to do a Chrono Trigger mod better be willing to do one of two things: Either go completely underground and work for several years with no encouragement or input from anyone outside of the project, or be willing to throw your life away and go up against Square Enix or whoever wants to sue.

Thanks for putting the mod together, and thanks for trying to get it out there somehow.

I won't keep cursing Square Enix here, but I'll curse them everywhere else until the day I die.

Belaith

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #3 on: May 27, 2009, 09:00:43 pm »
Lol, Damn. I tried to piss Dark Serge off before he was banned... but dammit.

Acacia Sgt

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #4 on: May 27, 2009, 09:01:57 pm »
At least we will have these videos. Although it's not the same as having the game, it's still something.

So, it was Dark Serge the culprit.

Lord J Esq

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #5 on: May 27, 2009, 09:03:39 pm »
I just want to remind everyone that, regardless of Dark Serge's actions, it was SE who made the decision to C&D us. I would hope that nobody forgets that SE are the ones responsible for where we are now.

desrever

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #6 on: May 27, 2009, 09:04:11 pm »
Just gotta shake it off. I'm still gonna follow thru with my project, and he can't stop meh.

Belaith

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #7 on: May 27, 2009, 09:06:06 pm »
I just want to remind everyone that, regardless of Dark Serge's actions, it was SE who made the decision to C&D us. I would hope that nobody forgets that SE are the ones responsible for where we are now.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but Josh, you're right.

Dark Serge is still a fukass

Chrono'99

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #8 on: May 27, 2009, 09:10:19 pm »
At least we will have these videos. Although it's not the same as having the game, it's still something.

You can watch the first one for now (link in first post).

Agent 12

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #9 on: May 27, 2009, 09:12:22 pm »
Anyone who has a higher standing reputation at other sites please feel free to submit the story there (I did reddit and digg).

--JP

teaflower

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #10 on: May 27, 2009, 09:13:18 pm »
Wow... and I thought I could trust him.

I want to know a few things, and I'd post them in the reddit and digg things, but digg hates me and I forgot my reddit pass... which sucks.

1. What are the chances that SE will ever release a statement about this? And what're the odds that they have a Chrono game in development?
2. Why did Dark Serge do what he did?

MDenham

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #11 on: May 27, 2009, 09:21:48 pm »
1. What are the chances that SE will ever release a statement about this? And what're the odds that they have a Chrono game in development?
2. Why did Dark Serge do what he did?
I suspect the answers are "slim to none" to both parts of #1, and "because he's an asshole" to #2.

FaustWolf

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #12 on: May 27, 2009, 09:23:10 pm »
Well said JP. Such a huge disappointment that we couldn't get an official statement, and SE is doing itself a disservice by letting skeptics believe that the Compendium just totally made this up. Everyone else who has a Final Fantasy, Secret of Mana, or other project based on SE's intellectual property will push forward with full steam. Best of luck to them.

As for #2 teaflower, I suspect it was just an attention grab. Given how he sort of stepped into the aftermath of the C&D here at the Compendium, I wonder if he wasn't entertaining aspirations of "replacing" Crimson Echoes or else looking for more prey if the email was real. In any case, he would often exhibit different language styles (you can see this even in Alienat0r's own posts over at Kagero), so he may actually be a conglomeration of different individuals. However, speculation does us no good at this point. I'm just glad kattrali led us to him, or who knows what would have happened.

V_Translanka

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #13 on: May 27, 2009, 09:23:24 pm »
Dark Serge was always a little antagonistically bent from my POV, but that might've just been because we personally butted heads on several issues...Maybe the word "Dark" in an SN is cursed on these forums~! And pizza. :lol:

I hope people take with them the fact that such large fan projects should probably be as secretive as possible and involve only the tight ring of the development group...and maybe just have completely open beta testing? idk...that's for some other website (or chain of websites) to deal with now...

nightmare975

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Re: The Month That Could Have Been Announcement
« Reply #14 on: May 27, 2009, 09:27:25 pm »
First, wow, Dark Serge, or whatever your name is, fuck you.

Second, I've heard rumors that Final Fantasy IV: The After Years was a ROM project that SE had also given the C&D to. Is there any truth to that?

And third, even if that rumor is not true, does SE have a copy of CE?