MOO3 Demo on PCPP mag {australian}

[nomad17]

fine, i will

[nomad17]

here.

[Daveybaby]

Well, at least its nice to know that things arent settling back down to normal after all the recent brouhaha.

BTW, i *still* havent seen anything thats made me believe this is real. But to be honest my head is starting to spin every time i look on these (or the delphi) forums, so what i believe doesnt really count for much.

Bleh. I need a holiday.

[ssgjames]

The links are broken. If someone got them, can you up them elsewhere or email them to me? (james@ssg.org)

edit: Pictures, that is

[Sencho]

Well, we're still waiting for official word Info and QS on what's going on. I've played the specific build that file refers to, and it sure isn't a demo. It's not even Moo3 as it was meant to be. My money is someone claiming to have the official demo leaked a pre-alpha build to the magazine.

It's not that hard to do. As hoaxes go, this seems to be rather successful.

[ASHBERY76]

Someone send me the screenies as i cant get the link
ashbery@hotmail.com please

[Xentax]

The latest

Ok folks, as far as I can tell, the material people are revealing is legitimate, in at least as much as they aren't faking it.

But this is NOT a "Single Player Demo of MOO3" as we've been saying, and as the magazine cover would suggest. The magazine's staff may well have been told that, however.

This is the E3 demo build of MOO3 at that time, or a similar variant thereof. What features it possesses, and how those compare to the final product (or even the state of the game at this moment), are unknown, but there's less correlation than the people that play this "demo" (pre-alpha build, more accurately) would probably expect.

So, here's where we stand:

Apparently, the magazine did, or is about to, mass-distribute this build. While they appear to have acted in good-faith, they were either hoodwinked by Infogrames' Australian branch, or by one or more individuals within that organization acting on their own.

QSI hasn't passed on word to us from Infogrames US yet (as of about an hour ago, they're waiting to hear back still), but QSI certainly doesn't view this is an authorized publication, and I doubt IG US will, either.

If you see this ... material ... first hand, my advice to you is to take it with a grain of salt. We've all heard Rantz say why he's against releasing such material early on, because it does NOT necessarily reflect the quality or even the nature of the final product. I think they'll be saying shortly (and I agree) that this build is NOT highly reflective of what the final game will look like.

Hang on to your hats; the full story will become clear soon enough, I think -- I'd estimate by the end of the business day Pacific Daylight Time at the latest (about 6 hours from when I write this).

[Zanteogo]

Well, I can say I am VERY happy to hear that.

No offense, but you need to give the public some credit. If I see some screens that are "less that perfect", I will understand. The pics of the space combat look fine to me. (not great, but I know it's an alpha build) Can't wait to get my hands on the "demo" myself.

[Zealot]

You mean Aussies will play MOO 3 with IFPs and we won't?
For the first time in my life I want to be an aussie...

[Zanteogo]

You mean Aussies will play MOO 3 with IFPs and we won't?

I don't think they will be doing much "playing". The game is a really old Alpha build for E3.

I should have my own copy of the demo soon.. for me, it's just one big pile of screen shots.

[Xentax]

Originally posted by Zanteogo
Well, I can say I am VERY happy to hear that.

No offense, but you need to give the public some credit. If I see some screens that are "less that perfect", I will understand. The pics of the space combat look fine to me. (not great, but I know it's an alpha build) Can't wait to get my hands on the "demo" myself.

With all respect, I gave "the public" no less and no more credit than they deserved. A hoax was definitely more probable than a real leak of the game, given the data we had to go on and the non-authoritative nature of the sources.

I try to operate on the principle of deciding based on what I know, while always considering what new data might yet present itself. Anyone remember the whole G4 Cube "leak" fiasco? People were trying to demonstrate how the photos HAD to be fake by pointing to what they claimed was evidence of bad editing, yet the images turned out to be real.

You'll notice I never tried to demonstrate that the images and such we've seen _were_ fake -- I just maintained that they very easily could have BEEN fakes. Given their pre-alpha nature, which has been confirmed, I still submit that they're not nearly as reflective of the final game as people will tend to think.

[CharonX]

Its all a conspirancy, I tell ya!
QS intentionally "leaked" the "demo" to the mag, so they put it on their CD and then all the warez groups gonna distribute the "demo" thousandfold - but since it´s not "the real thing" (and infected by harvesters) the audience waiting for MoO 3 will increase greatly (and all the warez currys & co will suddenly find them under attack of space-faring tree&plant lubbers popping out of their PCs)

Buggrem, millenium hand and shrimp, I told them, I told them, buggrem...

[MarkG]

cory nelson speaks

Folks. Here's the official word from Quicksilver. There has never been a demo intended for release. We do send off monthly milestone cd's to Infogrames so it's possible that the magazine has gotten its hands on one of those. We are having Infogrames look into the issue to find out what's going on. I'll let you know as soon as we find out. Obviously we're all a bit concerned here since a version made 6 months ago is in no way representative of what the game is now and would be extremely buggy.

ps. Yes that is a Mrrshan on the cover.

Cory Nelson, Producer
Quicksilver Software, Inc.

[MarkG]

"dude" signing as "Editor" of PCPP says on the pcpowerplay.com.au forums

Just to reassure all PCPP readers here in Australia: the MOO3 demo on PCPP#73's coverdisc was given to us, on official CD stock, by GameNation, the Australian distributor of Infogrames, who in turn is QSI's and thus MOO3's publisher.

Naturally we are very careful with material we put on our coverdisc. The situation is muddied becaase as a magazine we are not permitted to speak directly to QSI and are 'sheilded' from the developer by Infogrames, so I can only assume that QSI was aware of this demo.

I should also note that the cover image on this issue (the cat woman) was drawn specially for PCPP by QSI, which makes me think that they were perfectly aware of the entire demo distribution.

The MOO3 demo and MOO3 cover were the result of considerable negotiation and I have in my possession signed materials indicating that at the very least, GameNation and Infogrames are aware that we put the demo on our coverdisc.

I can only apologise to members of the online MOO3 community to whom this demo comes as a bit of a shock. I am not part of that community and was unaware that QSI allegedly said there would be no demo. GameNation assured me that the MOO3 demo was an exclusive, print-only demo with no online distribution, perhaps this is where the confusion arises.

I will be speaking to GameNation today about this situation, and will give anyone who's still interested an update after then.

Thanks!



-------------------------
Editor, PCPP

[MarkG]

and form the official forums

From: DEALPCPP

Hi guys this is Robert Deal from that mighty Australian games magazine PC Powerplay.
This thread was bought to my attention by one of our devoted followers and community members.
I can assure you people that we DO have a demo of MOO3 on our CD cover disc this month.
I suggest you contact our subs dept in Sydney Australia and get yourself a copy! +61 2 96990333
Check out our site (which may be a bit slow ATM -my apologies in advance)

https://www.pcpowerplay.com.au

Some guys may already have the demo and might be able to tell you a thing or 3 about it on our forums.
Game on!
-Rob

GULP!
I've just read the rest of this thread!
I had no idea of the importance....sorry!
Uuuum I honestly thought it was all above board!
OK all I know is that there is a signed agreement from Ozisoft who is the distributer requesting us (PCPP) to put the "demo" on the disc.
I can't imagine how this makes the development team feel that their art has been put out for all to see before the intended release.
OMG!
I guess I'll be hearing alot more about this but I can assure you that we had been "requested" to put this demo on the disc.
Rob.