Official Guild Wars support team fired

Just heard that the official support team for Guild Wars (headquartered in Austin) was laid off today. The only remaining official support appear to be some tier-1 clerks in India, and a handful of mid-level managers in Austin. The move appears to be a cost-cutting measure in reaction to disasterous sales results from other NCsoft properties such as Auto Assault. Any technical bugs with the game, starting today, will go unaddressed, which means this game I just bought is now essentially a $50 brick.

I'd suggest complaining about this, but I don't even know who you would complain to anymore! Emails can be sent from http://support.plaync.com/ : click on HELP on the left, then KNOWLEDGE BASE, and then on the right select the ASK A QUESTION tab. I guess we just have to fix the game ourselves, from now on!

Got a link for that? Can we get a confirm from Gaile on this too? Totally not good if it's true.

His thread was deleted from GWO.

Sorry guys, this wasn't an email exchange with the company, this was lunch with someone in the industry here in Austin. The support staff for Guild Wars was apparently not extensive to start with (don't have numbers), but it's now essentially non-existant.

I'd suggest contacting the company for more details, but, like I say, who do you contact at this point? I'm fairly sure any tech support emails are not being answered from this point on, at any rate. It's a sorry affair, considering how well GW's is doing, and coming just days after the big 2 million announcement.

trolling idiot

I did my best. Good luck.

Hilarious...

Complete BS.

I have a ticket that's been open with them for a while, they e-mailed me twice yesterday. Both times I was e-mailed from people who worked there a couple weeks ago.

The support team is still there, they still answer e-mails, and apparently the same people still work there.

I just went Auto Assault forum and found this.

Some of it seems to be true and one of the Dev's confirmed it

http://boards.autoassault.com/showfl...part=1#167622s

http://boards.autoassault.com/showfl...4#Post16 7634


Quote]NCsoft’s Austin business has announced an immediate restructuring within its organization that included the difficult task of reducing members of its workforce. The online games industry is one that is continually changing with the scaling up and down of business based on product launches and product development schedules.

Over the past two and a half years NCsoft has launched six major titles into the North American market and has grown with each title launch. As the company continues to grow its live products and prepares its next set of major online game releases for later in 2006 and 2007, the company sees a slowdown in its launch pattern and the need to streamline its business.

For this reason, NCsoft has reduced its 300 person workforce in Austin by approximately 70 people to accommodate this change. This decision has no impact on the schedules of any projects currently in development and service to NCsoft’s current games will continue without interruption[/Quote]

Not good. Support is the LAST THING online game co. need to be lax on...

reading comprehension 101 everybody.

there is nothing in that concerning support of games period.

this is in anticipation of slower launches in the future and has no effect on already launched games.

and here it is..............support for game LAUNCHES not game support.

Several of you are expending an amusing amount of energy pretending this didn't happen. It would be nice to get an apology.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/new...php?story=9837

I'll repeat, regarding GW, the support staff and QA staff is gone, with no plans to replace them or support/QA the game from this point on. Please see my original post for details on how to contact the company.

so far you have a press release stating that 70 out of 300 people at a single ncsoft office are being laid off, then we have an unconfirmed anonymous post on a 'dev only' board giving % figures of teams that are being laid off.

Probably best to believe neither, stop stockpiling tinned food and ammunition and wait and see what happens.

NCSoft owns ArenaNet, which is common sense with the smallest bit of research. But it seems some don't understand that, yet complain about "reading comprehension 101". That means that any ANet games are also impacted. Yes, it says MMO division. That includes Guild Wars because it is an MMORPG. Just check every gaming website out there and get the facts.

are you really saying those assorted 70 people some of whom were LAUNCH SUPPORT NOT GAME SUPPORT were actually handling the auto assault, lineage , COH/COV , and GW tech support?

did you note that this fits perfectly with the announcement of planned slowing of NEW launches ?

fewer new launches and they get rid of some launch support.

amazing co inki dink isnt it

You spoke of reading comprehension 101, Loviatar. Go back and read this story in full.

Here are the key points, bolded and underlined for you to read and comprehend easily.

GMs, QA staff and tech support. Hm, that to me says it's game support too bud.

OUCH!

SO it is true. Gamasutra doesn't lie either.

Customer Support wasn't really too good to begin with, but now its gonna be utter garbage. Way to set everything back NC Soft...

Apparently they are blaming this on low Auto Assault sales and Tabula Rasa.

alot of people got the big red bush boot and had thier moms call to tell them- told you video games will get you nothing boy! nothing! and now they are roaming the streets with crack

hi

want the OFFICIAL news?

well here it is

note the bottom bold and tell me what you think it means

You obviously don't comprehend what you just posted.

They're having a slowdown in their launch pattern, meaning they have to cut costs. To do this they have to reduce their workforce. They reduced their staff from 300 by appx. 70 people (this is from your posted clip), so they've got about 230 now.

Notice how nowhere in the article does it state that this was from the launch teams only? Did you bother to read the first paragraph which is the one I quoted which clearly tells everyone (except you unfortunately) that the staff has cut GMs, tech support and QA staff.

The article says there will be no impact, but that's said for press. That means that those who did not get laid off are going to be working harder, with more hours to pick up the slack so there will (hopefully) be no interruption to service.

GMs are for game support
Q&A staff are for game support and more.
Tech support is for game support and more.

Do you understand yet?

You call it official, yet there isn't anything on the NCSoft site about the layoffs. So it's rather hard to say what's official and what is not. Yet numerous websites are reporting already that it's 80% of GM's, 90% of tech support, 75% of QA. Which covers everything NCSoft has to offer.

Funny thing is here they have a link for "Now Hiring".

f13.net also has one of the key sources for the layoff news.

See here to read it in full

It says,
Get it yet, Loviatar? It says it quite clearly here as well.

80% of GM's
90% of tech support
75% of QA

So, you can stop spewing out that crap about it being launch, cause; sorry bud but it just is not correct.

Same for you aswell

Following rumors yesterday that NCsoft's U.S. MMO division had instigated significant layoffs that included 80 percent of its GMs, 90 percent of its tech support staff, and 75 percent of its QA staff, as well as a number of people from other areas within the company, the company has now issued an official statement confirming 70 redundancies

A post on website f13.net, which cited an unnamed developer-only message board as its source, attributed the layoff numbers to a drop in subscribers for the company's flagship City of Heroes/City of Villains PC MMO titles, which is allegedly at just over 100,000 subscribers, as well as poor sales of the recently released Auto Assault (which it claims has yet to see more than 10,000 subscribers since its April launch), as well as costs attributed to the ongoing development of Tabula Rasa.

Rumors is the keyword Since you cut that part out of your post.


NCSoft has now responded with an official statement confirming layoffs, though not necessarily in the percentages cited in the F13 posting, commenting: “NCsoft's Austin business has announced an immediate restructuring within its organization that included the difficult task of reducing members of its workforce. The online games industry is one that is continually changing with the scaling up and down of business based on product launches and product development schedules. Over the past two and a half years NCsoft has launched six major titles into the North American market and has grown with each title launch.”

The statement concludes: “As the company continues to grow its live products and prepares its next set of major online game releases for later in 2006 and 2007, the company sees a slowdown in its launch pattern and the need to streamline its business. For this reason, NCsoft has reduced its 300 person workforce in Austin by approximately 70 people to accommodate this change. This decision has no impact on the schedules of any projects currently in development and service to NCsoft's current games will continue without interruption.”


So the fact is that we don't really know how people got fired from which department/s within NCSoft Austin. All we really know is that 70 people lost their jobs and support will still go on for their games. Proof here
And quess what it was posted after some of them got laid off also and they still have QA for testing so work goes on.


If you believe rumors over official statements then I have some ocean front property in Kansas to sale you.

do you comprehend how tiny a spot on NCSofts map the Austin facility is?

they lost 70 personel from one minor facility and you act as if it were per cent of the whole company.

also if the support is gutted by 70 people leaving what about the remaining 230?

Their Austin offices weren't so small. 300 people is a lot. ALSO the reports are saying that they reduced the staff from 300 to 70 which means that they are firing 230 people not 70.

Also, there is the issue about the post on the Auto Assault forums that are RAN internally that confirms the reports that news sites are reporting.

http://boards.autoassault.com/showfl...4#Post16 7634

[QUOTE] you have it bas akwards.

from the OFFICIAL release

The statement concludes: “As the company continues to grow its live products and prepares its next set of major online game releases for later in 2006 and 2007, the company sees a slowdown in its launch pattern and the need to streamline its business. For this reason, NCsoft has reduced its 300 person workforce in Austin by approximately 70 people to accommodate this change. This decision has no impact on the schedules of any projects currently in development and service to NCsoft's current games will continue without interruption.”

sorry for dp but here is another bit of info

lose 70 jobs here and open a whole new branch over there.

Thought I would link you guys to Gaile's response to this situation:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s....php?t=3064071

i asked her to give an answer here and she gives it there

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&i...=Google+Search

Hey everyone, let's flame each other for something we don't really know much about!

Here's some points I would like to make:

• Google search does not yield pure truth 100% of the time
• We don't know from any of the articles you guys are citing whether or not this affects the actual Guild Wars staff
• Gaile said it doesnt, so it probably doesn't
• Flaming each other about reading comprehension accomplishes nothing
• Flaming in general also accomplishes nothing

/endbulletpointedrant

from the OFFICIAL NCSoft release

The statement concludes:[QUOTE] “GW is a current game

Hmm google search is saying the same thing as everyone else that 70 people got laid off and not 230 people as Omega X claims. It doesn't give any hits back saying 230 people got laid off so what more do you want?

For you to cite something besides Google Search as a source of information. Actual articles on the subject would do nicely, and there are plenty of them in this thread. Google Search does not count as a source because all it does is find sources and does not filter them for their credibility, at least not to my knowledge.

Not of NCsoft. True, NCsoft owns ArenaNet, but I am under the impression that ArenaNet pretty much runs Guild Wars on its own. Yes, it does indeed suggest that Guild Wars is unaffected, but does not explicitly say so. Anyways, it's irrelevant because we can certainly trust Gaile on this one. After all, she works there.

Actual articles just click the links in search link how hard is that?

according to the site Arenanet is a *wholy owned subsidiary* of NCSoft.

Anet is the maker of the game and NCSoft is the publisher with all the oversight rights/control of a publisher

i trust Gaile also

That is irrelevant. Google does not give you credible sources. Just a lot of them. We cannot debait the credibility of the source until we know where in comes from. To be fair, I see your point in discrediting Omega X's misreading with the raw number of results from Google, but quoting from the official release or any of the other articles already here would have been better, because their validity is already being discussed and thus you are not introducing any new articles to this debate before we finish the ones we're already on. As it is, you basically introduced every hit from Google as a new topic to argue about (although I hope that argument never starts).

It's not a big deal at all though. My main point is not really the whole Google search thing.

This is. Regardless of what all the other articles say (even the rather vaguely worded official press release), we can trust Gaile on this simply because she works there.

Discrediting Omega X's misreading was the whole point of the Google search link and nothing else. Since I and several others have already link, posted, quoted the official NCSoft response in the thread.

So their's nothing really left to talk about and this thread should just left to die.

Agreed.

DailyTech - NCSoft Lays Off 25% of Staff
Techgage - Review: NCSoft Austin Lays Off 25% of Staff

Nothing to see here, move along.

Linking to a GWG thread that links to a GWO thread on the subject...how odd.

Goodness, then during my weekly call with Customer Support in Austin this Wednesday, I was... speaking to myself? And those good folks from whom I received emails today are... nonexistent? A ghost of their former selves?

Sorry to resurrect this, but I was asked to do so, and here I am. No one is denying the layoffs, or the fact that 70 people were affected by that. It's very sad and regrettable. But would that affect Guild Wars? Render our game or our players "supportless?" Rest easy. Guild Wars will continue to receive support. Tickets will be answered and handled and reports will be investigated and bad people will be blocked and all such necessary things will be done in support of the game.

And keep in mind, anonymous "lunches with someone in the industry" are as reliable as "I heard it from the lead designer's sister-in-law's cousin's younger half-sister's hairdresser's pool boy."