By Jim Rossignol on February 13th, 2013 at 7:00 pm.
The news funnel at Eurogamer has become all clogged up with the surprise news that Minecraft-enrichened indie dev Notch is the mysterious benefactor behind Age Of Wonders III. Lennart Sas, managing director of developers Triumph (who previously made Overlord) told EG: “We noticed Minecraft’s random title-screen blurb mentioned Age of Wonders, so I thought what the heck and I sent Notch an email.”
This, as it turns out, was a wise move, as Notch is a big fan of the old myth ‘em up. Despite publisher interest, Triumph decided to let Mr Notch put his Minecraft dollars in because he didn’t push for the same harsh terms as a traditional game company: “He’s a fan of the game and didn’t insist on owning it like many of the publishers do these days when they fund development,” explained Sas. The game is now due in the autumn, and it looks pretty good, as you can see from the announcement trailer, below.
13/02/2013 at 19:01 Jack-Dandy says:
OOoooohhhh… Daaaaamn. Well, it’s a good use of his money, that’s for sure.
13/02/2013 at 19:07 Drakale says:
His money? More like MY money.
sarcasm levels [*************-]
13/02/2013 at 19:50 guygodbois00 says:
Not mine, for sure.
13/02/2013 at 19:06 DarkFenix says:
Fuck yeah. Always liked the AoW series, good to see its revival, it being publisher-free is just the icing on the cake.
13/02/2013 at 19:07 Rhuhuhuhu says:
It’s worth noting that they had to lay off a lot of staff after their failure of Overlord 2. As such, they had to run a lot on interns and outsourcing during a large part of the development. When they received funding for this project, it wasn’t possible for them to just hire new people since they sacked their previous lot with the ‘we can’t pay you argument’.
How the product will turn out, I can’t tell.
14/02/2013 at 15:55 Koozer says:
I enjoyed Overlord 2 :(
13/02/2013 at 19:09 caddyB says:
Fuck I never realized I’d be helping the gaming community in such a way when I pre-ordered Minecraft when it was on alpha.
13/02/2013 at 19:13 Drake Sigar says:
Parades will be thrown, medals will be awarded, fucks will be given.
13/02/2013 at 19:15 caddyB says:
Hopefully. I like to think of Notch as a guy who takes everyone’s money and uses it for better purposes.
14/02/2013 at 00:18 Eclipse says:
yeah like, bitches and dubstep parties
14/02/2013 at 02:37 caddyB says:
That’s better than how I use my money, that’s for sure.
13/02/2013 at 19:48 Hoaxfish says:
Indeed
14/02/2013 at 16:04 Universal Quitter says:
Don’t promise things you aren’t going to deliver.
13/02/2013 at 19:51 Beelzebud says:
I ended up not playing Minecraft very much, but I feel like every dime was worth it just because Notch didn’t turn out to be a massive douche once he got rich.
13/02/2013 at 19:16 Drake Sigar says:
Really like both the Overlord and the Age of Wonders series. Hopefully without a domineering publisher, they won’t collar me with any DRM. I think Overlords 1 & 2 were totally free of it.
13/02/2013 at 19:18 caddyB says:
You can see the GOG logo at the end of the video, good sir.
13/02/2013 at 19:33 Suits says:
that’s a digital distributor not publisher
13/02/2013 at 19:34 caddyB says:
GOG sells everything DRM-Free does it not?
Forget activations or malicious DRM – every game on GOG.com is 100% DRM-free
That means if they are going to sell it there and you buy it there, it’s going to be DRM-Free.
13/02/2013 at 20:59 Suits says:
oh right, it’s all DRM free there
13/02/2013 at 19:36 wengart says:
However all of GOGs games are drm free.
14/02/2013 at 01:58 Liudeius says:
Are you sure?
GOG is owned by CD Projekt RED, and they have used it for both their Witcher titles, so perhaps they are moving to be a publisher?
Though I suppose “publisher” generally suggest they are providing funding as well.
Speaking of which, why does GOG have a countdown on its front page? “System Found, Loading in 9:00:00.” Am I about to spend a bunch of money?
14/02/2013 at 02:38 caddyB says:
System Shock II, no?
14/02/2013 at 08:28 El_Emmental says:
The Witcher 1 and The Witcher 2 do not have any DRM when purchased on the GOG.com platform.
… Bought one of the Witcher game on another platform (like Steam), and now regretting it ?
Don’t worry, they thought of everything: http://www.gog.com/witcher2/backup
^ Here you can get your “backup” gog.com copy, by entering your non-gog.com copy serial key.
The “backup” copy is the entire game, minus the Steam/whatever DRM.
TL;DR -> people who bought The Witcher 1 or The Witcher 2 on other platforms than gog.com, get a free, DRM-free, gog.com copy simply by entering their serial key.
CD Projekt are like that.
13/02/2013 at 19:18 Vorphalack says:
If I had as much money as Notch, this is one of the top 3 personal indulgences i’d use it for, giving the developers all the time in the world to make this installment the best it can be.
Only i’d have also purchased a few tigers, and made sure the developers understood that if they fuck up even slightly, they will be eaten. With that much at stake you need SOME insurance ¬ ¬
13/02/2013 at 19:21 caddyB says:
I used to play AoW hidden from my parents late into the night with the lights and sound off and when I finally went to bed I’d dream of being a Highman Avenger.
This was the game that made me.
13/02/2013 at 19:35 Suits says:
Looks like this was his second choice when the Psychonauts 2 price tag was too hard to swallow
13/02/2013 at 19:20 P4p3Rc1iP says:
Heh, heard about this last week on a Dutch gaming site. Should have maybe shared that news… :P
13/02/2013 at 19:22 Soulstrider says:
Well I never cared about Minecraft or Notch but this was pretty awesome of him.
13/02/2013 at 19:23 Jockie says:
Let’s hope the game is awesome and everyone involved makes buckets of money, including Notch, who clearly has good taste and knows how to spend.
13/02/2013 at 19:30 Suits says:
Thanks for caring for Dutch devs
13/02/2013 at 19:43 bitbot says:
Finally he’s using all those millions for the good of gaming! What a hero.
13/02/2013 at 19:47 SkittleDiddler says:
As a HUGE AoW fan, I take back everything I’ve ever said about Notch and his legion of brown-nosers.
13/02/2013 at 19:53 b0rsuk says:
So if they are no longer terrorized by a publisher, why do they use the bleh 3D graphics ? Because, let’s face it, the graphics *are* average at best. It looks like a generic *RTS* game.
13/02/2013 at 20:13 noodlecake says:
And you can tell that from two tiny little clips?
13/02/2013 at 23:21 Dances to Podcasts says:
All fantasy looks generic, whether it’s 2D or 3D.
14/02/2013 at 06:26 Nick says:
TBS
13/02/2013 at 20:42 Didden says:
All I want to say is ‘Yay Yay Yay!’ lol
Loved the originals, and Elemental never managed to get close to their feel. Good for Triumph.
13/02/2013 at 20:43 scorpion_wins says:
What ho chaps,
Sorry for my lateness to the party, but have we established that this is indeed turn-based and not as was typed at some point in history, an RTS?
13/02/2013 at 20:50 Chris D says:
I believe so. It’s described as turn based in the Eurogamer article and there are visible hexes in the first screenshot, so it seems probable unless one of the factionsturn out to ba a race of giant bees. Also the “RTS” in question was typed by John Walker, who is a fine journalist in many, many respects, just not necessarily my first choice to explain the nuances of strategy gaming.
13/02/2013 at 21:01 Vorphalack says:
Considering the first game had Dire Penguins, I wouldn’t lightly dismiss the possibility of a bee based faction…
13/02/2013 at 20:56 Bhazor says:
Oh Notch. One of those rarest things, a nice guy with a disgusting quantity of cash.
13/02/2013 at 23:22 Dances to Podcasts says:
Game funding options, 2013:
1) Kickstarter
2) Notch
3) Indie fund
.
.
.
.
??) traditional publisher
14/02/2013 at 07:03 meatbagggggg says:
I wonder which Dev’s chimney is Santa Notch going to squeeze into next time?