Harpoon 4 Canceled

[Case]

These are sad days for us naval wargaming geeks

from: http://harpoon4.ubi.com/US/News/news_2003_11_26.htm
Ubisoft Cancels Harpoon IV
11/27/2003

Concerns About Product Quality Crucial to Final Decision

SAN FRANCISCO - November 26, 2003 - Ubisoftâ„¢, one of the world's largest videogame publishers, today announced that it has officially ceased production on Harpoon IV and has chosen not to release the title.

"Ubisoft is committed to making the best military simulation games possible, and unfortunately, the Harpoon IV project wasn't meeting this goal. In our judgment, the product quality could never reach a level that meets or exceeds consumer expectations," said Tony Kee, vice president of marketing, Ubisoft. "We will never intentionally ship a product that is sure to disappoint our discerning customer base."


While the game will not be finished or published by Ubisoft, discussions are underway to license the source code to a third-party group within the community in order to finish the game. Information regarding this development will be available soon at the game's community website harpoon4.ubi.com

[Urban Ranger]

Well, perhaps they would release it GPL? That will still be cool.

[rah]

I only played the first one, but it's sad to hear of it's demise.

[Boco]

I think I'll buy the new Harpoon Classic 2002 sometime soon, though. Had fun with the Win31 version way back when, even with all its faults.

[Raion]

They changed Harpoon II and made it Windows compatible and called it Harpoon III. That is on a website as it was done as a project, and can be bought there with updates with the database and such even to use for Harpoon II.

After all the delays, I wondered if they would even release Harpoon IV.

Harpoon III is a windows version of Harpoon II with database updates.
Some original people worked on it.

[Raion]

Link:

http://www.harpoonhq.com/

[Boco]

Anybody tried the naval games (Jutland, Tsushima, Guadalcanal) by Tiller at HPS Simulations (http://www.hpssims.com/)? They look intriguing, but I'd like to know how good they are before shelling out $50 US.

[Urban Ranger]

IIRC, AH also got boardgames of the same names. I wonder if these are just ports to computers.