Hell of a day. Plenty of time to talk later. For now, GAMES/TECH, RECRUITER/HIRING MANAGER FRIENDS: If you’re looking for great folks and are open to being contacted directly, please DM: name, email, company, roles, location. Thanks!— Scott Hartsman (@hartsman) October 23, 2018
This is the tweet Trion Worlds CEO Scott Hartsman put out after giving up his companies assets to Gamigo AG. He and the board of directors knew very well what was going on and knew the reality that many lower level employees would not be retained once they put their signatures on the paperwork. The higher level executives make off with their golden parachutes just fine while throwing those who made things work, out onto the street.
Hartsman tended to come across as a likable guy which is why he was given a pass by many. Not me. He is the CEO and the way that Trion took their player community for granted over the years, is a direct result of the decisions made by managers and executives. None of them get a pass in my book. Unfortunately, many of them will land at other companies perpetuating the bozo mindset that exists in the managerial ranks.
There were other people at the “director” level who didn’t help the companies cause. Former director of community relations Linda “Brasse” Carlson was both good and bad in this regards. She was fair with handling some community related matters and she fiercely defended the actions of her lower level staff when they were maliciously attacked (as it should be since toxic feedback is not the same as trying to offer constructive criticism). While not outwardly dismissive to the feedback which the player community offered, behind the scenes, it was known that she viewed much of that feedback as players just venting. The attitude was that if you didn’t like the decisions being made, you were free to move on. While I do subscribe to that to an extent, dismissing or outright ignoring constructive feedback from the community (where zero action is the result) has the end result of alienating those players.
For example, during the weeks following the initial announcement of Devilian’s closure, myself and others put forth reasonable feedback to offer better rewards along with removing the chat restrictions. The silence was utterly deafening with literally no interaction from any Trion staff except near the end when several announcements needed to be made including the transfer packs where the “we care about you” came across as patronizing given the lack of interaction period since late 2016 and throughout most of 2017.
There were many times when they would perform giveaways and fail to then execute on delivering the rewards (I still remember pinging Celestrata multiple times trying to get the mount that myself and others had won via a contest and being ignored; while others posted on the forums and also got the same treatment). The same happened when it came to compensation which they failed to live up to in several games (most of the ones I remember then conveniently “forgetting” happened in ArcheAge).
And this is a key reason why I don’t have much sympathy for specific individuals (that had a public face) who were cut loose from the company as time went on because they didn’t really care or take an interest in the Devilian community when many of us knew even before the announcement, that it was only a matter of time (given Trion’s and these specific individuals constant neglect).
For Hartsman though to tweet out something that has the tone of his company and employees being a victim (where he is going out to bat for them )when he knew what was going down before they did, is just pathetic IMHO.
