Honestly Guys, What Happened To Voxelus?

TheLastLink · Post by **TheLastLink** » January 5th, 2013, 7:30 pm

what happened to voxelus.

Semesto · Post by **Semesto** » January 5th, 2013, 7:38 pm

Well if you want honestly it basically went bankrupt, with one of the Mods leaving it couldn't continue. They might still be working o it still, slowly as a garage project but unless they can get it done it's dead.

Magmar · Post by **Magmar** » January 5th, 2013, 8:37 pm

Wasn't it that BlaPo used the voxelus engine or something made by one of the guys without permission? I guess he wasn't too happy about that and sued the company.

That's what I heard. Strange deal if you ask me.

Lysander789 · Post by **Lysander789** » January 6th, 2013, 4:20 pm

There are numerous factors that connect to Voxelus' demise. I'll narrow it down as thorough as I can:

-Lack of updates on the game's progress
-The affair with Xavier and Black Pony (the company behind Voxelus)
-Lack of funding

Voxelus was basically a unsuccessful last ditch effort to revive the spirit of Atmosphir, but starting into a new game. Voxelus had a great start; however, as time went on, the community fell apart one by one. Excitement and spirit went down. It went nowhere. It's sad cause we all wanted to play the game. I heard some tried making their own games, but I don't know if they succeeded or not.

The Voxelus spirit and game are now gone, but I still feel the community spirit on these OMB forums.

Post by **Wowfunhappy** » January 7th, 2013, 11:53 am

Edited the topic title to be more descriptive.

Essentially, the only person who was ACTUALLY making Voxelus was Xavier. No one else at Black Pony was actually contributing towards it; it was Xavier's game.

Xavier, naturally, wanted to be paid for his work. Martin refused, so Xavier quit his job.

Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?! So how are you paying for your vacation?

bboy99 · Post by **bboy99** » January 7th, 2013, 11:54 am

Wowfunhappy wrote:Edited the topic title to be more descriptive.

Essentially, the only person who was ACTUALLY making Voxelus was Xavier. No one else at Black Pony was actually contributing towards it; it was Xavier's game.

Xavier, naturally, wanted to be paid for his work. Martin refused, so Xavier quit his job.

Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?!

There goes all my hopes and dreams...

winningkill · Post by **winningkill** » January 7th, 2013, 11:56 am

Wowfunhappy wrote:Edited the topic title to be more descriptive.

Essentially, the only person who was ACTUALLY making Voxelus was Xavier. No one else at Black Pony was actually contributing towards it; it was Xavier's game.

Xavier, naturally, wanted to be paid for his work. Martin refused, so Xavier quit his job.

Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?!

I didn't even get to play voxelus

Miniike · Post by **Miniike** » January 7th, 2013, 12:58 pm

Wowfunhappy wrote: Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?!

Wait, MARTIN? That awesome guy? He actually-
MARTIN.
I AM DISAPPOINT.

winningkill · Post by **winningkill** » January 7th, 2013, 1:01 pm

Miniike wrote:Wait, MARTIN? That awesome guy? He actually-
MARTIN.
I AM DISAPPOINT.

Me too. He got a bomb shooter named after him in atmosphir(Repetto)

Miniike · Post by **Miniike** » January 7th, 2013, 1:07 pm

winningkill wrote:Me too. He got a bomb shooter named after him in atmosphir(Repetto)

Really? I never noticed.

Post by **Phantomboy** » January 7th, 2013, 1:16 pm

Well it is nice to have an answer. I doubt it was the answer that most people wanted, but rather or not you want to admit it- it is kind of fair to say most of us assumed something similar to the reality of what occurred. It is, unfortunate but fair enough really. Especially regarding a product that would be (or at least, I assumed would have been) free. When you aren't taking in a direct income form your product and you have workers expecting a paycheck it become a problem.

TheLastLink · Post by **TheLastLink** » January 7th, 2013, 2:28 pm

Wowfunhappy wrote:Edited the topic title to be more descriptive.

Essentially, the only person who was ACTUALLY making Voxelus was Xavier. No one else at Black Pony was actually contributing towards it; it was Xavier's game.

Xavier, naturally, wanted to be paid for his work. Martin refused, so Xavier quit his job.

Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?! So how are you paying for your vacation?

I didn't know about that. Somehow I'm not surprised.

Lysander789 · Post by **Lysander789** » January 7th, 2013, 2:42 pm

Wowfunhappy wrote:Edited the topic title to be more descriptive.

Essentially, the only person who was ACTUALLY making Voxelus was Xavier. No one else at Black Pony was actually contributing towards it; it was Xavier's game.

Xavier, naturally, wanted to be paid for his work. Martin refused, so Xavier quit his job.

Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?! So how are you paying for your vacation?

So that explains the Xavier vs. BlaPo affair more clearly now. I had no idea Mr. Repetto didn't have money to pay, yet he STILL had money to have a vacation in Brazil. All this time I thought it was Xavier's and BlaPo's rudeness that lead to Voxelus' demise. I also thought more people were building the game besides Xavier.

After reading this, I understand it all.

Semesto · Post by **Semesto** » January 7th, 2013, 5:08 pm

Wowfunhappy wrote:Edited the topic title to be more descriptive.

Essentially, the only person who was ACTUALLY making Voxelus was Xavier. No one else at Black Pony was actually contributing towards it; it was Xavier's game.

Xavier, naturally, wanted to be paid for his work. Martin refused, so Xavier quit his job.

Martin says he didn't have any money, but he said that while he was vacationing in Brazil. No money? Really?! So how are you paying for your vacation?

Hm I see... -_-

Post by **Lemon** » January 10th, 2013, 5:49 pm

Well guys, there is a slight difference between income and 'having money'. It would be very unrealistic for Martin to pay Xavier with his personal money. My father owns a company, and he does not reach for his wallet when it is payday. However, it is very realistic for Martin to pay for a vacation with his personal money, as that is his money and his luxury.

Voxelus had no funding. There was no method of paying Xavier other than personal money. And no offense to anyone, but I wouldn't have payed Xavier with my personal money either. That would just be bad business skills.

Don't think that I am just opposing what everyone is saying for fun, just know that Martin is not Halsey Minor.

Nazmus · Post by **Nazmus** » January 10th, 2013, 6:59 pm

Lemon wrote:Well guys, there is a slight difference between income and 'having money'. It would be very unrealistic for Martin to pay Xavier with his personal money. My father owns a company, and he does not reach for his wallet when it is payday. However, it is very realistic for Martin to pay for a vacation with his personal money, as that is his money and his luxury.

Voxelus had no funding. There was no method of paying Xavier other than personal money. And no offense to anyone, but I wouldn't have payed Xavier with my personal money either. That would just be bad business skills.

Don't think that I am just opposing what everyone is saying for fun, just know that Martin is not Halsey Minor.

I had the exact same thing in mind. It never makes sense to pay your employee with your personal money. You pay employee from the revenue the company gets. After everything is paid out, whatever remains is the profit. Martain makes his income from his personal job. That's his money, not Black Pony's.

But no, Martin is not Halsey because if he was, he wouldn't have started Voxelus in the first place. He wanted to create Voxelus for the community, not for money. Think about that for a moment.

TheLastLink · Post by **TheLastLink** » January 10th, 2013, 7:00 pm

Lemon wrote: Don't think that I am just opposing what everyone is saying for fun, just know that Martin is not Halsey Minor.

What's that supposed to mean?

Anyway, if you ask me, completely assimilating some guy's personal project and not even paying him to develop it when he clearly had the money.
And if he didn't, don't start a company.

You don't start a company and not expect to pay somebody for working for you.

TheLastLink · Post by **TheLastLink** » January 10th, 2013, 7:02 pm

And where do companies get the money to start off with?
1: Out of your pocket
or
2: From an investor.

Atmosphir started with money from an investor and it lasted a long while.

Voxelus started with no money from the founder of the company and it didn't even get off the starting line.

Nazmus · Post by **Nazmus** » January 10th, 2013, 7:03 pm

TheLastLink wrote:What's that supposed to mean?

Anyway, if you ask me, completely assimilating some guy's personal project and not even paying him to develop it when he clearly had the money.
And if he didn't, don't start a company.

You don't start a company and not expect to pay somebody for working for you.

Unless when you hire a person, you agree with them that he will get a cut of the revenue of the company. In that case, if the company gets no money, no one gets paid. Now, I don't know what the agreement was, so I can't say much more.

Post by **Wowfunhappy** » January 10th, 2013, 7:17 pm

What I know is mainly from talking to Xavier, so it's a bit one-sided. But it sounds like there never was a formal contract. Xavier was under the impression that Martin would pay him as soon as he had the ability, which he did. Obviously Martin saw things differently.

I don't mean to vilify Martin, as I know he wanted the game to succeed. He did in fact invest a large sum of money into Voxelus, but it went to licensing music, graphics, etc. He really should have paid more attention to Xavier, who was undoubtedly the single largest contributor to the game.

I actually think the thing I'm most resentful about is that Martin essentially lied to us. From the onset, he gave us the impression that there was a team of people developing the game. Later, when Xavier left, Martin told Adz that Xavier was experiencing "personal issues" (ie, family death, divorce, etc). It was several weeks before we found out the truth.

At the end of the day, I blame Martin. I don't think he's an evil greedy person, but he should have communicated better with Xavier. And, you don't just not pay the one person who's doing the actual coding for a project.

And on some level, I think Martin knows this. Otherwise, he wouldn't have tried to hide it.