Here's a good article that goes into some detail on the Gamestop / Impulse / Stardock team up.
http://www.joystiq.com/2011/03/31/stardocks-brad-wardell-talks-about-selling-impulse-to-gamestop/
Considering that your account was sold to Gamestop, I think the "ethics or concern for their customers that Stardock has" was largely an illusion.
I was thinking they'd be more into Xbox 360 stuff, since that is their primary income generator. And some of that could be offset with tournament buy-ins, say $10 or $15 per person. By rotating the games utilized you drive sales for all those in the leagues, and potentially their desires to trade the games in when the league is done with that particular title. Also, this would be layered on top of their usual sales tactics. The reason you don't see too many Internet cafes in the West is that personal computers and consoles are quite popular. In Asian countries they utilize their cell phones more, and other portable devices. So there is makes sense to pay for time at a cafe and not have the computer laying around the home.
I think all that are unhappy with this should change their avatar to a My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic character to show that they find the change over more distasteful than having a pony image. Because if you are going to make a statement, you got to show you really mean it.
Some people seem to think it is too 'girly' or some such. Generally it is not that they do not like ponies, but that they are unwilling to admit they like them.
It also helps that it is not common on this site, so it will stand out.
At the rate they're locking threads today, I kind of wonder if anything with a pony in it will be locked next.
If this really is true I'm done with Impulse. Gamestop is basically the lowest scum of the retail game industry, and I will not support them or trust them with my digital licenses. I guess Brad figured they will never compete with Steamworks and cashed in while he can. Good for Brad, questionable for Gamestop, bad for everyone else.
Guess I'll be picking up The Witcher 2 from GoG.
Mmm, mostly they've been trying to keep the discussion centralized in one or two threads. We did, however, learn that Brad doesn't know what "melodrama" means.
The first comment on that article sums up player's views on Gamestop very well.
They wouldn't be distracted for very long. Yes expansion takes some considerably expertise but with the right people it can easily be done and by doing so they'd be keeping profits to themselves. How big is the team that handles Impulse anyway? Not that large so I fail to see how it would be terribly difficult to slowly increase it's man power over time. I just cannot understand why someone would throw something successful away for any reason.
I have a very bad feeling about this.
Gamestop has been reducing pc games carried for years and years now.
In fact it was the reason i found stardock in the first place was to get away from a store that really did not want my pc gaming money that bad.
I'm just not sure what all this means just yet. I'm not ready to freak out. I'm not saying that at some point I won't make a crazy rant in regard to Gamestop, but I like to wait until they start making changes. Maybe this could be a good thing? I know that it's generally a waste of time to go to a Gamestop if I want a PC game, they have one rack and it's filled with WoW expansions. And I don't blame Brad for selling it. Shit, if he doesn't want to spend all his time and resources being a retailer, then he should sell impulse. He has every right. I do worry that Gamestop isn't a company I trust, like I trust Stardock. But, still going to wait and see before I nerd-rage.
I just think some people have too much time on their hands. People seem to invest a lot of energy looking for something to be outraged about. I guess I shouldn't be surprised given how much vigor I put into debating the merits of OS/2 vs. Windows back in the day.
Only time will tell how this all works out. But knowing the team involved and being privy to the direction, I have a high degree of confidence that people will be pretty happy about the results as time goes on.
Call me crazy but I think this implies that Gamestop wants back into the PC market. The trend is to Digital Downloads anyway, and those are not something Gamestop in its current form can profit from... until now. Since I serioulsy doubt Microsoft or Sony would allow an online Gamestop/Impule store for consols (drool) the one place for them is PC games
They have seen the writing on the wall, someone at that company knows that the current brick and mortar model won't last forever.
I'm really not sure what to think of this.
While it's true I never used Impulse to actually buy anything (nor steam or GG or any other online distrib), I was looking forward to getting some tittles off of Impulse after I get my new comp this fall. Now???
Well I don't have any compelling reason to stick with Impulse as far as I can see. Hell no reason to stick with anyone at this point. Not like that matters to anyone, and not like I won't use Impulse if it seems to be the best fit for me still.
I guess it's kind of disappointing to me, since I do like Stardock, and would have liked to have supported them (however indirectly) though using Impulse, but at this point it doesn't matter to them where I do my shopping I suppose. I've also never really bought the whole 'what happens in 10 years when the site goes down and I can't play my 10 year old game' logic so that part of it is immaterial to me, trust for gamestop? No earthly idea whether I should or shouldn't. Sure, I don't go to their stores anyway, who's to say they won't get the DD part right? It's not as though Impulse it going to start stocking only Wii games is it?
Since it is not exactly that extreme, likely not. It mostly just serves to show just how much of the Impulse user base GameStop will have to win over if they want the continued business from those people.
And it would be kind of hard to lock ALL the threads.
If anything people, at least in the US, should be outraged first and foremost about the ever-inflating debt of our country. Also, the reliance on foreign energy and renewed demonization of nuclear power as a potentially viable alternative energy source for wide-scale use.
Anyway, I certainly hope Impulse doesn't become the sort of service that requires logging into Gamespot servers each and every time one wishes to play the game that they payed for, where server downtime means zero game access time...
The star ruler devs have pulled their game from Impulse due to Gamestop's new ownership.
Given that they purchased game streaming techology at the same time, I think they plan to go to a model of never having the games be on your computer, but rather running in the cloud. At least for future games.
Well I hope you got a sweet deal out of this Brad.
I'm not happy with Gamestop taking over my account management because of past experiences but maybe it will work out.
I know that I won't be buying anything else off of Impulse for a while. I'm going to wait and see what kind of changes take place first.
If their CEO (miss read stuff ) one of the people at BMS uses the same name here as on their forum, then he did not seem happy in the thread this... event... was announced in.
I had been thinking of releasing my game whenever I finish it on Impulse, but now I may be looking for a plan B.
I was quite saddened. I really do like Impulse as a platform and its staff as we knew them were great. Yet, that is not enough I'm afraid.
[Also I'm not a CEO. We're a 3-man LLC and not a corporation. We're basically all 'co-lead developers' with my boss owning the whole company.]
To be clear: The game will not be pulled just yet. It will not be pulled until the 'keys change hands' so to speak. That should be sometime in May. (All current users will still be able to update their game and et cetera. By Pulling I mean 'it will no longer be offered for sale'. I do not mean to imply that Star Ruler will vanish from Impulse for our current customers. We fully intend to support all Impulse customers to the greatest extents possible; up to and including an in-game updater solution so that you don't lose the convenience of automatic updates for our title. It won't be as slick as Impulse of course. No running in the background and silently updating stuff. But it will at least prevent you from having to go through the hassle of patch after patch, seeing what patch patches what and so on.)
That's pretty interesting, because as I recall it Impulse listed Star Ruler before Steam would even return your emails.
Not saying you're wrong or not entitled to do what you want with your game, but are you sure delisting the game isn't something of an over-reaction?
Well, my posting history in the other thread will show that I'm not one of the doom and gloom people on this... but locking a lot of threads sends the wrong message. There are upset Stardock fans out there. It's better to let them vent and get it out of their systems so to speak, then engage in a disucssion once they calm down some. Locking threads and telling people to go away and stop being melodramatic isn't going to help.
Anything people are emotionally attached to (and Stardock gets that reaction from people) will face this kind of a response to change.
I like ponys, especially sparkly ones...
Also agree with what Tridus said.
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