A letter from a fan

[PsychoGenetiX]

When I was around 12 years old, I went to Megason, a video game store, the owner of which was an old man who was a good friend of mine. I asked him if he had some good RPG games (I didn't know my way around games back then), and he got up off of his chair and opened the display closet for me, and handed me a copy of Titan Quest. "Just got here, I think you should try this out" he said.

Well, I didn't know my way around games back then, but I trusted the man and paid him a hefty sum (for a 12 year old kid) for the game, something which I didn't generally do. I hurried on home and installed it on my crappy old computer, and spent the rest of the week playing the funnest RPG I've played yet, With a lousy 15fps framerate on low graphics. I had SO much fun I didn't even mind the bad graphics quality and how pathetic my computer was, and I just played until I finished the game. Ever since then I've been returning to it and it's expansion pack, alone and with friends in co-op, throughout the last 6 years (of course eventually I got a better computer).

One day, I learned of what happened to Iron Lore, and it hit me like an anvil. A Digital Anvil, if you get what I say. You see, it was actually a sort of history repeats itself kind of thing, at least to me. I've had alot of favorite games die on me in my lifetime, the most important of which being Freelancer, which was like a second life to me when I was younger, until Microsoft dissolved it's developer, Digital Anvil, and shut down Freelancer's global multiplayer servers. The game suffered a slow and painful death, but the community lived on and kept it going until today.

The good thing though, was to find out that Titan Quest, even though Iron Lore was gone, lived on thanks to the community as well, which taught me the power of a game's fans.

And these two games, Titan Quest and Freelancer, which came from relatively small companies, taught me another thing:

When you have pure intentions, and all you want to do is make a good game and get it out there so people can play it, you make beautiful stuff. You make stuff that changes people's lives. People like you are the reason the video game industry is where it is today. You have that divine spark that the original game developing pioneers had in the 80's and 90's.

I've discovered and have been lazily following Grim Dawn's development since a few years back, and god am I proud to see you guys back up and running again. I couldn't believe it at first. After watching a few videos, I told my friends and we were very excited about Grim Dawn for a while until these good news got outshone by the release of raging beasts the likes of Starcraft 2, Call of Duty, Diablo 3 and League of Legends. We had our fun until today I decided to come back and check on what's going on with Grim Dawn, and I found out about the Kickstarter project. The community DOUBLED the original goal!

I don't care if your name is Iron Lore or Crate Entertainment, whoever stayed and worked on this game up until today is a HERO in my regards, you did what Digital Anvil never had the guts to do, you rose out of a dead company's ashes and made something beautiful.

In my regards, these things are sacred. The way you guys fought through the beauraucracy and nonsense and budget problems and crew shortages and all that, it makes me wonder; you guys already have jobs. You have income. What interest would making a game be to you if you have to DO all of this? Well you're just like me. You have respect for a good game. A world to create and share with other people. You dedicate your free time to work hard on something which was, originally, not intended to succeed, because you KNOW that if you work hard enough, your game will be out there. And the community came to your aid because we all know what you guys are capable of doing, and we all respect the way you work hard to make good games, not for the money (while there is money), but for the sake of GOOD GAMES. And that's what I consider sacred.

Right now, I'm a computer graphics designer and an amateur 3D modeller. Some day, I will start my own game development studio; A studio with the same purpose yours has: To make good games. And I will always remember (like the rest of the lessons I've learned from my favorite games) the way you guys pulled through with Grim Dawn, and your dedication to the thing you like to do the most. And I don't care if I have to swim knee-deep in crap to get my game out there. I will.

There's not many things I can say that will express how much respect I have for you guys and how much I'm rooting for this project, but I hope you understand. Never stop doing what you love doing.

I'm going to watch Grim Dawn closely until it is released, and I will support this project by buying the game soon. (When I have the money).

Thank you, and good luck!

Sincerely, Tom.

[Younghappy]

That was a good read!
Most of us here on the forums have similar stories to you; we played Titan Quest, loved it to bits and played it continuously for years, and when we discovered Grim Dawn, made by the same people that made Titan Quest, our lives felt complete
I, for 1, have infinite respect for Arthur Bruno and the Crate Team... some of them don't have jobs and have been working of Grim Dawn without an income! I know that Arthur Bruno (the lead designer on Titan Quest, he designed the masteries and alot of other important stuff) has been doing this, but I don't know about the rest of the Crate team
Of course, this will change with Kickstarter, and now with the money (double what they wanted!) Crate can hire more dedicated people that have the same respect for games as they do (like us on the forums!)
Long live Crate Entertainment and Grim Dawn!
Oh and welcome to the forums!

[yerkyerk]

Hey Tom, you've got some nice writing skills there. Also, almost free from grammatical errors, that's a rare sight on forums.

It's very true too - except for the part of having jobs, iirc; I think medierra and Rhis have foregone jobs so they could be working on this project full-time, which, frankly, is even more awesome. Jalex and Zantai recently joined the full-time crew after the Kickstarter ended. The rest of the Crate devs have been working on this in their spare time.

Yes, it's a dedicated bunch. Even if the project somehow tanks - which I can't even imagine anymore at this point - I'm still glad I've supported them. They've given us a lot more than we've given them.

Also, welcome to the board!

[Lex]

Excellent post! I really enjoyed reading this because I feel the same way about TQ. I enjoyed the game not only because it brought hours of fun entertaining gameplay. It also was able to attract my father into playing with me which was a blast. We would constantly try to out play each other and get better loot, see who can get to level 75 first, and so many more little competitions. I know this game will succeed because when you put this much effort and dedication into something and it comes from the heart, people will recognize it. Especially if the developers actually listen to fan feedback, respond to our comments, and consider every idea we have. I so desperately awaiting this games arrival I hope it will re-unite my father and I to play it together. Because we have a close relationship and we do a lot of stuff together but he never wants to play video games with me. So hopefully Grim Dawn will do the trick and help me out here.

Welcome to the Forums!

[JOCool]

Couldn't agree more with the sentiment and I even had a little rant about a slightly related subject recently (if you want to read). One thing for sure these days, its nice to see a growing community who actually communicate in a positive manner.

Welcome!

Later,
~J

[Zantai]

Thanks for the story, Tom.

While I did not work on Titan Quest, these sorts of profound personal tales played a significant part in changing my career to game development.

[PsychoGenetiX]

Thanks for the replies and the warm welcome. It's nice to know the general feel of the TQ community carried on over here: nice and welcoming.

I wonder, how many people are working on the project full time right now since Kickstarter?

[yerkyerk]

4;
Medierra
Rhis
Zantai
Jalex

[PsychoGenetiX]

Nice. Two new peeps since the kickstarter video.
Sounds good!

[yerkyerk]

Might not have been entirely accurate;

RPS: Just to return to that point, how many people are you?

Bruno: Well it was just two people, myself and a programmer at the time of the Kickstarter. Others worked part time- contributing artists, animator, sound and music guys – these were people who had by and large become busier, mostly ex-Iron Lore people, and essentially we got to the point where because of all the added life distractions, productivity was slowing down a bit. And at the same time we had a lot of people who had pre-ordered early on, and we were feeling pressure to speed things up. The Kickstarter came at just the right time for that, because it allowed us to pick up the pace, to hire, and to have a more reliable workforce to schedule the remainder of the development with. That meant that we could estimate a completion date. We now have a six person team, and some money left over to pay for outsourcing.