The beginning of the end for Digital Jesters?
 

http://www.backtogames.de/upload/hom...reen_56jpg.jpg
Bet on Soldier: Blood Sport received average to mixed reviews, but do the developers deserve the treatment afforded to them by their UK/US publisher?


I was rather surprised to receive the following email this morning from the developers of Bet on Soldier: Blood Sport:




Now, this would have baffled me were it not for me remembering the comments made by wael in relation to his most recent Sherlock Holmes game. Digital Jesters seems to be making a habit of treating the developers badly, which, combined with a couple of financial scares, is causing me to lose faith in the team. I noticed that The Silver Earring is due to be published on a different company's budget label, and Kylotonn are also looking into a new publisher.

So, the question is, will all of this news wreck the company, or will they somehow survive, Tri Synergy-like? Or will they be forced to show more repsect for the developers?

This is all making their commendable company philosophy look exceedingly ironic...

Perhaps I'm just being cynical but the fact that this:
and this:

http://www.digitaljesters.com/images...g/imgSmall.jpg

appear on the same page is also somewhat comical. :)

What the hell is Crazy Frog? It is referenced left and right but I must have lost more touch with reality than I though becuase I'm clueless.

...bysmitty

You're better off not knowing!

(Read all about it)

Its this little bugger that plagued UK tv through some stupid ads for a Mobile Phone ringtone company, then he went on to screw up the Beverly Hills theme song....i really liked that song but now when i hear it i cant stop thinking about thoes friggen *ding ding baaaaaaaaading* noises :(

You can listen to clips here...If you dare

On topic, it does seem as though Digital Jesters are slowly killing themselves (interesting email you got there, Mr Lacey). I only found out about them by chance a few months ago - are they a major distributor in Europe? I don't think I've ever seen a Digital Jesters game here (Trackmania Sunrise, for example, was distributed by QVS Software in Australia) so I don't think it'll make a lot of difference to me whether they sink or swim. Might be a different matter as far as the rest of the world is concerned though.

Adventure publishers to adventure developers: "You want your game published? Bend the **** over, I'm going in."

They're of the "small, but steadily growing" type. They've previously only done UK (and occasionally elsewhere) titles, publishing Beyond Divinity, Trackmania, Savage, Chaos League, Sherlock Holmes, The Moment of Silence and Freedom Force vs the Third Reich in the UK. Bet on Soldier was to be their attempt to break into the US market.

As for the email, I wouldn't have believed it had it not been sent to the email address that I've used around the Digital Jesters website, and had the press release since also not found its way onto GamesPress. And if I hadn't heard of the troubles that wael had had (I saw an advert in a magazine about a range of budget releases suggesting that the Holmes game was being republished by a different company), I would have had difficulty accepting the accusation. As far as customers are concerned - except for their use of Starforce - Digital Jesters have been nothing less than very, very good.

I wonder what House Of Tales experiences with Digital Jesters was like? and if they are going to stick with them on their next game.

I remember they ran allot of Ads on Sky One before any scifi program started, they sponsered about 5 different shows.

Martin didn't seem too impressed with them when that discussion with Wael came up. :(

As I alluded to in my first post, this is a similar situation to the one that a couple of developers I know found themselves in when dealing with Tri Synergy. The difference there, though, was that Tri Synergy didn't advertise their games either, and so very few copies were sold and the developers never received any money.

Ah yes, that little irritation-ware gem came with my version of TM Sunrise too (seems QVS just stuck with the Digital Jesters format). I still wonder if it was just coincidence that my CD burner ceased to function immediately after playing that game. It prompted me to upgrade to a DVD burner though, so I won't complain too loudly.

That said, I'm now wary of distributors that use Starforce as a matter of course.

Not that I want to turn this into a Starforce rant. Carry on...

Except I'd never call Bet on Soldier an adventure game.. :)

People around here have perhaps only heard about the situation with Frogwares and DJ. There's been lots more. It began with their UK distribution deal with the french publisher Nobilis - they signed a bunch of PC and PS2 games (ten or so), but only ever released one or two of them.

After wael complained about DJ here, he and a few others wrote an open letter to GamesIndustry.biz, showing that it wasn't just Frogwares who were having problems with DJ. You can read it here: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/news.php?aid=12780
(Cyanide is responsible for the Pro Rugby Manager games and Chaos League, Nadeo is responsible for the TrackMania games)

A couple of days after that, KaosKontrol/Diezel Power sent out this short press release concerning DogTag (tactical shooter for X360 & PC):

KaosKontrol, Inc. terminates publishing agreement with Digital Jesters

TOKYO – JAPAN - November 8th 2005: KaosKontrol, Inc. announces that Digital Jesters has been in breach of contract and that KaosKontrol has terminated the publishing agreement with Digital Jesters with immediate effect. KaosKontrol has additionally moved to petition a compulsory Winding-Up of the company 'Digital Jesters Distribution' with the district court of Birmingham in the United Kingdom and informs that its attorneys may initiate legal steps against the directors of Digital Jesters for fraud under section 206 of the Insolvency Act 1986. The development and ownership of game products are entirely unaffected and KaosKontrol will rapidly move to place them with another publisher.

For more information contact:
Hirohisa Ono, Director of Development, KaosKontrol, Inc.

That's the story so far. A guy from DJ said they'd issue a press release about the Bet on Soldier-situation soon.

The latest info from MCV:

The expected closure of Digital Jesters is being followed by the creation of a new games publishing and distribution outfit called The DJ Group.

Read the rest here: http://www.mcvuk.com/newsitem.php?id=619

Apparently, The DJ Group (consisting of the old DJ guys) have aquired DJ's assets, such as Crazy Frog Racer and Wild Earth, but won't have to pay any of DJ's debts. Pretty clever, eh?

Though ofcourse there's a chance they will try to sort things out (thanks to the 5 mill investment they've gotten). It's probably unlikely, but maybe it's wise to give them the benefit of the doubt.

I'm sure someone mentioned that before.

Martin or Wael.

Actually don't think it's big or clever.

Pretty awful if you ask me. Especially if you were a developer waiting for money you are due.

Why should they be allowed to continue like nothing has happened?

I was being sarcastic with that "pretty clever, eh?" remark.

Anyway, now they've made an official press-release:

NEW PLAYER ENTERS THE GAMES INDUSTRY
Myriad Interactive Creates "The DJ Group"
Friday 25 November 2005/... Myriad Interactive has agreed an investment plan which will provide $5 million to newly formed British games publishing and distribution outfit The DJ Group. This signals one of the largest investments in recent years in the UK games industry, which has been suffering from multiple company closures and job losses.

Myriad Interactive is being headed up by Marco Landi, ex president and COO of Apple Computer, and the remit of the group will be to establish a series of games labels in order to publish and distribute a wide portfolio of games globally within the next 12 months. A fast growth rate is mapped out.

The company will publish hot property of the year 'Crazy Frog Racer' for PC and PlayStation 2 on December 9th and the family-friendly PC title Wild Earth early next year.

The DJ Group will be operating a number of publishing and distribution companies and intends to introduce titles under individual brands which include DJ Interactive, DJ Distribution, Digital Jesters, Turtle Games and Monte Cristo, each of which will cater for different market segments. More will be announced over the coming weeks.

"We've big plans for the DJ Group," says Marco Landi, president, Myriad Interactive. "We've already set up our infrastructure, and it's our intention that this new group will quickly grow through expansion and acquisition into a real major player. Crazy Frog Racer will really set out our stall. We're staffing up quickly and will be making more announcements shortly.

The group is actively expanding its reach both in the UK and globally and expanding staff, infrastructure, partnerships, joint ventures and acquisitions. In the UK alone it expects to provide over 100 jobs in the first year including management, games, specialists and developers.

Oops, they edited an important bit -

We need a Sacastic smilie.

Anyway if the quality of their titles is "Crazy Frog" then I won't be buying anything from them.

The sad thing is that developers will still go to them even though they know what happened to the last lot.

Isn't this, like, the third time that DJ have changed company name?

Wouldn't that kill the sarcasm?

Or were you being sarcastic? I couldn't tell.

(Insert sarcastic smiley here)