Mythic moves towards crediting former WAR team
IGDA chairperson praises developer for adopting fair crediting practices
Jen MacLean, Chairperson of IGDA, has praised Mythic for its attempts to resolve the issue of un-credited developers on Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, and has offered an apology for comments made in the group's previous newsletters.
Late last month, it was revealed that Mythic would not be crediting the full development team who worked on its new fantasy MMO, only the team that presided over its launch. However, since then Mythic's VP and general manager, Mark Jacobs, has "began a process of formulating new credit policies", according to MacLean.
"I criticised Mythic's credits policy specifically, and the industry in general, for not adopting inclusive credit standards," read her comment in the IGDA newsletter. "After an interview with N'Gai Croal of Newsweek and Level Up blog, Mark asked N'Gai for his thoughts on the subject. N'Gai suggested simply putting the full credits online."
"Mark is in the process of implementing N'Gai's suggestion, and in doing so, Mythic will move towards a greater level of credits inclusiveness."
Mythic has said it will now reserve the in-game and manual credits for launch teams only but will create an online database listing the name and title of everyone who contributed to a project, regardless of current employment status. The developer has also committed to making an effort to provide this information for its previous online games and will begin working with the IGDA and its Credit Standards Committee to promote fair and accurate credit practices.
MacLean went on to add: "Mark was honest about a difficult subject and immediately after the interviews ended, he began a process of formulating new credit policies. Unfortunately, when the previous newsletter was sent out, Mark, unbeknownst to me, was quietly continuing to work on a new credit policy for the studio. Mark, I regret that my comments caused you personal and professional distress... please join me in recognising Mythic's new crediting efforts.
EA recently announced that Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning has seen half a million users register to play, since the MMO's launch earlier this month.