Remember that moron, Mike Maulbeck, who dared to threaten Gabe Newell because Steam listed his game as an early access title? It got his game removed from the mammoth online platform. He apologised and resigned following the outburst. Fast forward a few weeks and he is now back at the studio he left, Code Avarice, ready to work on a new title.
Why the return though? Surely there is no going back after threatening Lord Gaben? A recent blog post on their site sheds light on the matter (via Eurogamer).
Mike is back. This is probably not hugely surprising to some of you, but Mike couldn’t commit to his decision to leave Code Avarice. Travis (the other co-founder) publicly denounced his departure, and in the weeks following his official stepping down Mike had second thoughts. Looking for a new source of income was extremely overwhelming and when it finally came time to put pen to paper, Mike and Travis agreed the best thing to do would be to have Mike return to Code Avarice. In retrospect we should have waited until everything was finalized before making the announcement, but Mike was extremely eager to just get out and never look back. He posted the announcement to the site before even talking to Travis about his intentions.
I don’t know… to me, and based purely on these past few weeks, Mike seems to be the kind of guy who acts before really thinking things through. Valve got his game listed incorrectly? Better threaten the head honcho himself! Game gets removed from the Steam store? Time to resign and abandon the company!
Thankfully, Code Avarice are making some good choices moving forward. Any future updates will have to be written and approved by BOTH the co-founders.
From now on rather than blog posts being written and signed by one of the developers, they will all be co-written by Mike AND Travis, and written from the perspective of the company rather than an individual. We have also created a Code Avarice official twitter account so you no longer have to follow personal twitter accounts to get development updates. Every tweet posted from the Code Avarice twitter will be co-written by Mike and Travis just like the website. Interacting with Mike and Travis will now be completely optional
Hopefully, Travis will catch any threatening tweets or posts before they go out. I’ve heard some people questioning whether this was some planned publicity stunt. Personally, I don’t think so. Sure, it brought a ton of attention to the studio, but will they be allowed to release any of their future titles onto Steam? I just can’t see a studio being successful on PC without their game being on that platform. Why would they risk such a thing? Regardless, this whole sage hasn’t prevented them from starting their next title.
In more exciting news, we’re happy to announce that Spinal Destination is definitely happening! We’re going to release some more info on it soon, but for now you can get excited over the tagline “Left 4 Dead meets Timesplitters meets Painkiller”. We’re really excited to use all we learned making Paranautical Activity to make something even better.
It sounds interesting. Will it find success though? Who knows. Would you support this studio after all this drama? Leave your thoughts below.
Last Updated: November 17, 2014
RinceThis
November 17, 2014 at 10:38
How does someone even get to this position by acting like a child?
Brady miaau
November 17, 2014 at 10:48
I work with some brilliant engineers, seriously so. But social interaction and so forth is not a strong suite. I try to interface with other people on their behalf.
RinceThis
November 17, 2014 at 10:50
So like… http://www.clickypix.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/The-IT-Crowd-30002.gif
Brady miaau
November 17, 2014 at 10:59
Something like that, yes
Quo Vadis?
November 17, 2014 at 11:49
I think they should place any BSc, science or PR. Eng course under “Asocial Sciences” at varsity. holy hell they cannot interface with anyone, and trying to understand their language, is like speaking to an alien.
Mossel
November 17, 2014 at 12:01
It depends though, the civil and industrial guys tend to be more outgoing. The electronic and process engineering guys are like the nerds of the nerds. They wear jeanekkies (jeans with tekkies). And probably have a leatherman on their belt.
HvR
November 17, 2014 at 12:08
Excuse me I do not wear a leatherman on my belt.
The big one is in my pocket with a pocket clip and the small one as a key chain.
Mossel
November 17, 2014 at 12:10
lol! I actually had one of those mini Leatherman’s! But lost it somewhere!
HvR
November 17, 2014 at 12:17
🙂
I found the personalities very a lot, think I’m in between; one on one I’m fine but standing in front of a crowd of more than 8 people I break out in sweats and go socially retarded.
Main thing is Engineers have a low tolerance for BS, more than 10 min with marketing and executive management and I seriously have to work on keeping my Dark Passenger suppressed.
Mossel
November 17, 2014 at 12:30
haha yeah man I know how you feel! Had a conversation on Friday with some of my commerce friends and every 5min I stopped them to correct them! I think they gor iriitated…lol. But I mean I was gonna start twitching with all the incorrect information they keep on exchanging! But I agree though, it does vary a lot. You get these super nerd/genius guys that literally drank beer the whole day and smashed 75% in the exams, then you get the shy guy that just studies a lot and gets 80%. Then you get the inbetween guy (me) that drinks beer the whole day and just barely pass with 50% (more then enough am I right?!).
Quo Vadis?
November 17, 2014 at 13:29
I deal with all the structural and mining engineers’ contracts. FIDIC and the NEC3 stuff. But holy hell when it comes down to the “little” stuff like the mechanicals and electrical thingies they put in, the briefs that come across my desk…. and to try to get them to explain it to you in digestible format, they give you the deer in the headlight looks. And you have it spot on with the jeanekkies hahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!
Brady miaau
November 17, 2014 at 14:04
Try proving one wrong!
Admiral Chief Wang
November 17, 2014 at 10:48
I’m wondering the same thing about you…
😛
RinceThis
November 17, 2014 at 10:54
Here’s your pot.
Admiral Chief Wang
November 17, 2014 at 10:42
HE IS HOLDING UP THREE FINGERS!!!!!!!!
AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Alien Emperor Trevor
November 17, 2014 at 10:44
Yes, but if you look closely you’ll notice the ring finger is bent forward slightly indicating a fraction, not a whole number. So it’s probably HL2 E3, not HL3.
Admiral Chief Wang
November 17, 2014 at 10:45
I CAN LIVE WITH EP3!!!!!!
Frankly I NEED to know what happens post Ep2
Rock789
November 17, 2014 at 11:27
Maybe it’s just a 3/4 version of the Vulcan hello – so, perhaps, live long and don’t prosper? Or prosper only slightly… 😉
P.S. Yes, HL3 confirmed!! :p
FoxOneZA
November 17, 2014 at 10:42
As Phil S pointed put, Indies do need some PR guidance from platform holders.
Ceyber, Hans
November 17, 2014 at 10:44
Those game titles… Paranautical Activity and Spinal Destination? These guys don’t exactly strike me as original.
People should stop giving these imbeciles the attention, they really don’t deserve it.
Bob the Zealot
November 17, 2014 at 10:50
“Mike couldn’t commit to his decision to leave Code Avarice”, at least Steam stuck to their guns. 😛
Cadis Etrama Di Umar
November 17, 2014 at 10:51
I don’t believe he should be condemned for it as really now, I doubt he would murder Gaben (before HL3 fanatics). He seems extremely short tempered and acts before thinking…Hopefully he will learn from this all.
Ceyber, Hans
November 17, 2014 at 11:09
I get what you’re saying and I hope he gets up and over this ‘hurdle’. But at the same time, as the front(?) for his company; foresight in action and preparing for consequences should be prerequisites.
The other problem is that if he isn’t duly punished or at least properly reprimanded it does in fact set the unsaid bar lower, a bar and industry standard which I feel is too low already, what with nonsense like the Fish fiasco and Gamergate.
Just my two-cents.