A lot of freelancers are feeling that way right now. In addition to wishingt for Shdaowrun to survive and hoping to get paid (order of importance varies, of course). And like AH said, it fits information coming from very close to the source.

Hell yeah, amen, so say we all, <any other general phrase of enthusiastic agreement inserted here>

Damn it, I liked CGL too.

maybe we could use some funding scheme, like the Kickstarter, to raise the funds for the books that are missing/non printed yet.

here is the link


They got a feature on Wired.com, and there is so much JUNK that has gotten enough money that, hell, who knows?

www.kickstarter.com

I won't comment on Frank's post at this time.

However, I will state that on Monday, March 15th, I resigned from working as CGL's bookkeeper and office manager, due to a conflict involving my personal ethics. The Operations Manager resigned the week before that, for similar personal reasons. I have been told that Adam Jury, our Layout Guru and Overall Awesome Guy, resigned as well.

Oh the irony of the real life.

$850,000? I hope the selfish bastard who did this gets locked away for a long time.

Yes! The best way Dumpshockers can help out is to slow down, take a deep breath, and not let rumors get out of control. I have heard the rumors, I know there are problems, but I have also talked to the entire management team at CGL and have not heard plans to shut anything down. There are matters that definitely need to be addressed--specifically, the future of CGL as an organization and the outstanding, long-past-due payments to freelancers. I've asked management to address those issues, and they will be meeting tomorrow to discuss their best options.

So in the meantime I'd ask everyone to calm down and not spread rumors. I'm very sad that CGL has recently lost some very good people, but I remain hopeful that we will continue producing great Shadowrun products for you, and that the people who worked on those products will be paid what they are owed.

I'm happy to answer questions in this thread or through PM, but I again ask people to keep speculation on this thread to a minimum.

Jason H.
Shadowrun Line Developer

but . . but . . this is dumpshock . . this is what we do O.o

I asked some questions in my first post in this thread. If you are able or willing to answer any of them...

Thanks,

K.

Hey folks:

Just want to throw in a couple things:

1) I definitely appreciate people's enthusiasm for Shadowrun and their willingness to find a way to help the game continue. That said, the advice given on this thread to not work for free is good advice. If you've got a skill like writing, drawing, or laying things out and are willing to put it to use on a project that's going to be sold, you deserve to be compensated for your efforts. All Shadowrun freelancers deserve to be paid, and I am hopeful there will be a plan to make this happen.

2) It's amazing how quickly a thread about rumors of possible malfeasance turned into statements of seeming fact. I'd ask people to be careful with their assumptions.

Thank you all for your passion on behalf of Shadowrun.

Jason H.
Shadowrun Line Developer

Adam Jury resigned from CGL

Sorry to hear this.

Been some great stuff coming out of CGL.

Certainly sounds like a viable business especially when ever a real Shadowrun computer games gets made.

Let me go through and put answers beneath each of knasser's questions.



The whole question is based on the premise that there is not going to be upcoming print runs. I have not heard that that's the case; if I do, I'll provide updates about the supply.




Correct--there is not reason for PDF sales to change at the moment.



Catalyst has fiction rights and has been working on new fiction for both Battletech and Shadowrun. New fiction for Battletech still comes out regularly through battlecorps.com, and there are novels in the works. I know there is a Shadowrun anthology that is about ready to go, as well as two novels that have been through their first drafts. I don't have more information about the timing of their releases.



The license is set to expire in the next few months. I've asked management to address this issue in a public statement.

I know that's likely not as long on specifics as you might have wanted, but I'm afraid that's what I have at the moment.

Jason H.

Wow. Just wow.

Hopefully this all gets sorted. I've seen this phoenix arise from the arises more than once. I am supremely confident that the brand will survive - unless of course WOTC pick it up and WOWify it as they did with D&D.

- J.

I think most here can attest to thinking the same. I'm almost certain no one would buy a WotC 5th Edition ShadowRun, unfortunately if it does come to that, we might inadvertently kill off the game forever (other than all of us still playing 4E).

Anyway, I'm sure this can get sorted out and we can all go back to embezzling fictional currency of non-existent mega-corps run by mythological creatures.

Ok kids. See my Sticky thread about this. But I'm leaving the thread open for the time being on one condition... Everyone plays nice and is very, very civil about the situation.

Right now, there's no public facts, just speculation and rumor coming in 2nd and 3rd hand. Right now, I know about as much as the rest of you at this point.

I'm asking everyone to contain discussion to this thread only, and as I said, play nice.

And Don't Panic.

Bull

Hey Jason, one more question.
What can we do to help? For those of us inclined to try, give us a direction.

I just want to say two things:

1. This sucks. I thought that for a change, Shadowrun was going to be stable for awhile.

2. I love how everyone turns this into an opportunity to rag on another company and for bringing edition wars FOR A DIFFERENT GAME IN A DIFFERENT GENRE ENTIRELY into this discussion.

WTF people.

As Demonseed Elite said elsewhere, the animosity is not with the fans, it's with the company. I have the unhappy privilege of falling in with the group of freelancers that hasn't been paid yet, and it's one of the (many) reasons that I'm pretty much done with Shadowrun as a freelancer, even after the property moves to another developer (and it will; it's a very lucrative property).

Its called defection we dont want to even think of SR going down the pan so we shug it off and make jokes about D&D 4th ed. Just a guess but it fits.

I love Shadowrun and I love Catalyst. I just found out about Eclipse Phase and I'm very excited to get my hands on a print copy of the book.

I'll be hoping all the difficulties get worked out for the positive... and I'll be hoping I still receive my print copy of the 20th Anniversary Limited Edition I ordered last year

I'll also probably head to my LGS to buy any Shadowrun print edition I'm currently missing... on the off-chance that print runs suddenly become rare.

I hope this does work out for the freelancers, who certainly deserve to get paid. I also hope the rumors have been exaggerated, but am not expecting that to be the case. The confirmed resignations already sound like a really bad situation, getting worse. If there is anything we fans can do, I would love to hear about it, but it sounds a little out of our hands, at this point.

Why can't we just push Topps to extend their licence for 6 months ? If we say, if you don't give them the time to get back on their feet we just don't show the money ? They are getting money out of this and we has customers are have the power to change everything ... we own the money

Alright, something that is (presumably) not based on speculation: Could somebody enlighten me on which company exactly owns or has licensed what? So far I only knew about CGL which are owned by In Media Res (headed by Coleman and Bills IIRC), now there is one more level of it?

If CGL does lose the rights to Shadowrun, I hope they get snapped right up by a developer who will do right by the franchise (no matter who that might be; I'm not wild about WotC, but I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt). I also hope everybody from CGL lands on their feet (with the exception of any putative embezzler(s). Finally, I really, really, REALLY hope that the SR4A limited edition that I preordered over a year ago does actually find its way into my hands.

Because to Topps, who make billions off of baseball cards, we are not even a blip on the radar.

Topps owns the BattleTech and Shadowrun licenses for print products. Microsoft had owned the electronic rights, and I am not sure if they sold or simply sublicensed those rights to Smith and Tinker.

InMediaRes Productions, LLC DBA Catalyst Game Labs has licensed the BattleTech and Shadowrun rights.

I would say that it's valid speculation on who would have the cash and "think" that they can handle the game world. I can see somebody in upper management at WotC or Hasbro thinking they could take it. I don't think they could UNLESS they brought in a bunch of outside designers (or horribly mutilate the system).

White Wolf is a possibility, they deal with dark game worlds. Paizo is a possibility as well, several of their adventure paths for 3.5 D&D and their Pathfinder system show that they have the creativity to deal with twists and turns. Crafty has experience with modern settings, but other than those I can't think of any other game publishers that might pick it up off the top of my head.

The Shadowrun Intellectual Properties are complicated.

When FASA Interactive (a division of FASA Corp) was purchased by Microsoft, the Computer gaming rights went to FASA Studios and stayed with Microsoft. Smith & Tinker licensed those rights from Microsoft in late 2007.

When FASA Corp (the RPG company) closed their doors, the non-Computer gaming rights went to WizKids. When WizKids was purchased by Topps, those rights went to Topps. When NECA bought WizKids, Topps held onto the Shadowrun rights.

FanPro licensed the Shadowrun rights from WizKids. When FanPro ceased game production, Catalyst Game Labs, an imprint of InMediaRes, licensed the game and fiction rights initially from WizKids, and then later directly from Topps. Per a 2008 Press release, their license is up for renewal this year.

Mongoose and Cubicle 7 have been buying up all sorts of licenses recently, and doing very well.

My apologies, I did not mean to insinuate that the freelancers would have animosity toward the fans. I meant that if the freelancers got a little something out of it all, they would be more likely to hop on board/stay on board if things changed.

Wow. That'll teach me to go to work all day and not check the boards.

If Adam J is out, I don't have high hopes for the future.

Right now my greatest hope is that the 6th World Almanac sees the light of day before the whole thing implodes (Anybody remember SoLA?). That and getting my SR4A LE would be real nice.

Speaking of: I certainly feel for the unpaid freelancers (and of course none of us really know how much CGL owes to who), but I would be surprised if unpaid freelancers represent a larger unpaid liability than all those unfilled pre-orders sold to fans...

This is actually a possibility worth further consideration, as WW's flagship line of nWoD is getting its own cyberpunk setting through Mirrors, a July release.

Combine that with inherent similarities between the two systems, both thematically and mechanically, and it begins to look rather likely.

As a quasi-freelancer (who actually received his first paycheck from Catalyst recently) I'm disappointed that I had to hear of these mass resignations through a public message board. I have no reason to doubt Frank at his word and I'm sure the truth will come to light very soon once the spin control and rumor-mongering die down.

There's no reason to believe that Shadowrun in its 4th ed. incarnation will cease to continue. Perhaps with another publisher after a long delay or perhaps it will be business as usual in a few weeks. But it's incredibly sad that this, whatever this is, has resulted in mass resignations of recognizable names (some of whom haven't chimed in yet), especially Adam Jury, who had his finger in pretty much every Catalyst pie. I hope that Posthuman Studios held onto legal ownership of the Eclipse Phase game line as it would be a shame to see a property with that kind of potential disappear. CthulhuTech , a new interest of mine, is co-owned by Wildfire, LLC so hopefully it will survive this as well.

For the creator, game production is always a labor of love. Other than the upper echelons and the lucky entrepreneurs, few can survive on the game designer paychecks alone. SR will continue on at some point but it's obvious a lot of trust has been broken. Whoever is responsible for breaking said trust is going to have some major karmic backlash heading his way soon.

You may continue with your nonsensical WotC-r-teh-suck posts now.

You guys are all way off base.

My bet: Shadowrun will end up with Weisman again.

How could he pass up the chance to have both the computer and paper rights again?

Seriously.

Perhaps, perhaps not. I know I am owed several hundreds of dollars. I know of freelancers who are owed several thousands of dollars, each. That's just for work on Shadowrun. I can only imagine that there are similar stories on the Battletech side of the house. It's all anecdotal and I don't have any numbers beyond what I've been told by friends who've not been paid, but still....

The unpaid freelancers might not be a larger unpaid liability, but they're certainly a longer-standing liability, and just guessing, they're probably pretty close in magnitude to the outstanding pre-orders of SR4A LE. So while you might be surprised, I hope it's not too big a surprise.

This is...disheartening. I just got back into Shadowrun this past year. It's my favorite game. I often jokingly say that Shadowrun is my religion.

But it's not the first time this has happened. I believe that Catalyst may not pull through, but Shadowrun will. It's simply too strong of an IP to let hang. This may mean that we have to go through another dark age, but things will survive.

Right now, I hope for the sake of the Shadowrun staff, and indeed the entire Catalyst staff, that you all get to keep your jobs and incomes. Catalyst has been good to my game, and I'd like to see you continue to be good to it.
If the worst comes, then hopefully you all and Shadowrun can find a new home.

If only we should be so lucky!

You and me both.

Is it just me or does it seem like the rumored corporate intrigue surrounding SR and CGL is just begging to be made into a 'run?

Like maybe Miracle Shooter's latest patch has a bug in the AR coding. It causes the Miracle Shooter application to register smartlink signals as designated players and paints them as AR monsters. A tech noticed the glitch days before it was scheduled to go live and went to his supervisor with it. The supervisor realized he had a gold mine here and convinced the tech to stay quiet. He then shorted his stock options with Ares and made last minute arrangements to defect to Horizon with "information that Ares knowingly released software that got kids killed" as an offering. Horizon accepted and poured money into mudslinging/counter advertising against Ares in preparation for the impending media shitstorm. The problem is that the tech had a conscience and reported the glitch. Now the next boss up the Ares foodchain hires the runners to extract the defector for "questioning." The only problem is that since the glitch was corrected Horizon lost money on useless mudslinging, the stock didn't dive and now the defector owes some unfriendly Italians alot of money and he's in the wind. The runners have to find the guy and get him to the J while keeping him safe from Mafia hitsquads and other runners hired by Horizon.

I realize that this might not be the ideal place for a run idea, but seeing as this is rumored corporate skullduggery surrounding SR I couldn't resist. Sorry.

Gonna be a sad session tonight when I at least let them know that Catalyst might be going down the drain, I hope desperately not though

Well......Hellfire and Damnation. This was a unpleasant surprise. It's decipher syndrome all over again

As thought, One might wish to consider Red Brick Limited as grabbing the SR IP....

Did CGL carry any type of insurance which might cover the loss? I am certainly hoping for the best.

I want to say that I've been a fan of SR for a long time, and I have a darn near complete collection from 1st edition on (I think I'm missing one or two novels.) I've even bought books in German and French just because they're SR. I went to DragonCon one year specifically to get Larry Elmore sign my first edition book. I took time out of my schedule one time to stand on the street corner in Chicago where the Bug City nuke goes off. (Pretty sad...I know.) That being said, I know that SR will soldier on. Its a great intellectual property, and I think the SR4 crew should be commended for the great job they've done in revitalizing a great product. SR4 is the best yet, and I've been continually impressed with each new book. I can only hope that this situation will be resolved quickly and we can get back to talking about our favorite game.

I'm also excited to get this week my new copy of the "Red Brick" version of Earthdawn. If Earthdawn (which Ancient History and I share a mutual love of the interconnections with SR) can survive all of the turmoil it has experienced, then I know SR won't be off the shelf long.

I wonder if Steve Jackson Games is interested? They seem like a fan-friendly publisher with a long history.

What happens when/if somebody else picks up the rights? Do they get to reprint CGL/FASA books, or do those go into limbo?

This makes me sad.

I want to wish the employees the best of luck during these hard times.

I was talking to Garou about this. While I would sure love that CGL would continue with Shadowrun, let's take a look at the possibilities:

WotC won't be buying the shadowrun rights for the next 5 years at least I would say. They just closed their contract with LucasFilms to publish Star Wars RPG. The last book will be released in April and they will offer support to August. And we all know that Star Wars is much bgger than Shadowrun.




WW is a possibility, but I don't know if they would have the cash and patience to buy the license and wait for the profits. Also, Garou told me that they usually keep the edition instead of making a new one (as we sure know WotC would do).




I mentioned SJG too, but Garou pointed to me that they don't have any RPG material with the kind of continuity that Shadowrun has. Also, they would probably create a new edition instead of keeping the 4th.

Let's wait and see. No need to cry 'Wolf' unless we hear him howl. Right now he just barked.

There is not an insurance policy in the world which covers what Frank speaks of, that I know of.

It's why embezzlement is so devastating.

Well....drek. I certainly feel silly, having pre-ordered SR4a LE a week ago...
Anyone know the odds of me seeing either my money or my book?

Odds are good it's still rumors ...

The LEs are on a boat making their way slowly to the US. Nothing that has happened has affected the existence of the boat or the LEs. Once they're in, they'll be shipped.

Jason H.