Ex-Mythic members will not be listed in the game’s credits for their development contributions.
Already pressured by its publishers to cut features from the final product, Mythic Entertainment confirmed to Shacknews that it will also be slashing names from the game’s credits. Those who won’t be listed are those who were once on the development team but didn’t stay on for the entire project.
“Over the years, we’ve had hundreds of people work on the game, and we thank everyone who helped us bring our Warhammer passion to life, but only current employees that have continued until the end will be credited in the final game,” said Mythic Vice President Mark Jacobs. “Accreditation in Warhammer Online recognizes the incredible team that has poured their heart and soul into making WAR an amazing MMORPG experience.”
One upset ex-employee calls Mythic’s actions “dogging out many, many developers.”
Mythic’s incident is not isolated; Capcom ran into the same trouble earlier this year when it removed worker names from Okami‘s Wii version.
“This has been an ongoing problem in this industry for many years. I spent three years on WAR and I, including many other people who spent just as much if not close to the same amount of time, will NOT be credited in the game,” continued the anonymous source.
Standards set by the International Game Developers Association state that “any person…who has contributed to the production of the game for at least 30 days of a 12-month or greater project…[or] any person who has contributed during 10% of the project’s total time in development [for projects shorter than 12 months].”
The lack of accreditation for anyone who has contributed to a project is one of the many issues that industry employees are starting to take seriously.
“The actual people who do the menial tasks and long hard hours deserve their credit,” stated the source. “If our work is to be ‘shown’ in a game and ‘shipped’ on a released game then that developer should be credited…I wish to get all former employees of EA Mythic / Mythic Entertainment together to discuss this and possibly take legal action against EA.”
