Smedley steps down.

Surprised no one posted it here. Well, sort of not surprised. But (I see Radar posted a snippit ) Here you go:

John Smedley is stepping down as president and chief executive officer of Daybreak (the company that was once Sony Online Entertainment), the publisher confirmed to GamesBeat. Current chief operating officer Russell Shanks will step in as the new president of the company.

Daybreak Games confirms that John Smedley will be taking some time off from the company for the near-term and transitioning to a different role to be determined. Upon finalization of his plans, further communication will be provided.

http://venturebeat.com/2015/07/22/d...medley-steps-down-as-chief-executive-officer/

Can't say I'm necessarily surprised but still hope things work out for him. In consideration to the information regarding LizardSquad and Smedley, I think I would want to take a break too. While I do not agree with some stuff in regards to PS/PS2s history, I hope Smed all the best in his time off!

I subscribed to SWG for years. I can only say I am hopeful for the future.

I'm Sorry to hear your stepping down John, although I can perfectly understand why after what you and your family have been put through. Wish you all the best for your future.

Good to see him go. It is him and Higby - two guys who don't know how to treat their playerbase with respect.
I'm not sure how much he is at fault for today's state of the game, but it was developed under his watch, he is responsible. And most likely it was his decision to waste more than a year to port the game to console. Maybe it was somehow a good decision, I still don't agree with it, and don't want it.

After not stepping down November 2005 i didnt think anything would.

Maybe some fresh ideas at the top will do the company good,
and get them out of their release game - random changes nobody wants or needs - milk - abandon - repeat, way of thinking.

I don't know if it was necessarily maliciousness though. It couldn't have been since he wants his product to succeed. I don't know obviously what drove some decisions but I'm sure some of the previous issues had to be tied to finances under SOE. Higby in particular has expressed how there were presses from external departments outside of the dev team which Smedley had to work/find solutions for.

One key thing I do reference often though was, before SOE became DBG, Smedley had said Planetside 2 in particular had just started to turn a profit. So almost three years of not generating a return? Thats kind of a big deal.

He meant that the game recouped development costs. It is normal for an online games to spend several years on that.

And now we're coasting on a dead game that will only ever get the most minor of updates.

Not a surprise considering what's happened lately ...
And I do wonder how much this was his own choice and how much was " advised " by his bosses ..

Smed's always struck me as a nice guy , who wears his heart on his sleeve ... But who is his own worst enemy at times ..

Hopefully though this break will remove the target from his back and allow him to have some rest and deal with any issues without any more personal or family attacks .

I feel like PS2, the game that I like and care for, is terribly mismanaged, has too little resources (despite the "we will have so many resources we won't know what to do" claims after SOE became DBG) and uses the resources they DO have for things that very few of the players actually want or need. (And yes, I did spend money on it)
Because of that I am not terribly sorry to see him go as CEO.

I am however sorry for all the trouble the lizard-******** are causing him as a person.

As I previously said, screw Shizard Squad. All they did was add factory-made salt to the wound, and now we've got our CEO stepping down. I can only hope the best life has to offer for Papa Smed.

I see an issue with this as a whole. Not from a PS2 standpoint, but the ties cut from the transition of SoE and Daybreak. Former employees that were pushing titles such as EQ Next had their manpowered literally fractioned comes to show where "profit decisions" may lead you.

The sad fact is the playerbase of video games want games they will remember for the rest of their lives. And just trying to sell quantity > quality ( like trying to go console and possible mobile ports) will leave that bitter taste and taint reputations. I for one don't mind him stepping down as I've seen him at the helm for way too long. I am still disappointed at the loss of some of the most passionate employees before him. As he had to sign the termination decisions. So I ask you Smed, was cutting those ties and following the emulated business model of microtransactions over multiple platforms worth it?

I realised we were playing the ps4 beta the moment that i heard it was going to happen.

If it didn't click for people then, surely the recent changes to be exactly like the ps4 version are enough.

This seems to me that it's either linked to the shizzardsqawd stuff or it's a case of matey boy being more capable than smed for the role.

Well this is truly the end of an era. SOE being spun off was one thing but now no more Smed. I wonder if the owners thought it rather poor behavior of a CEO to be blasting Twitter with his outrage at the Gizzard squad and asked him to take a break. Who knows? Maybe he is going to get a whole new identity somewhat like the witness protection program does lol. Regardless of the past and how many may feel about him, I know he is passionate about game creation and finds his way back in some formal capacity soon.

So.. is this a good thing or a bad thing for planetside?

There is also the option that it is totally unaffected.

But as so often: Only time will tell...

Passion however doesn't mean good. On Smed created an atmosphere of distrust between the company and a huge portion of their consumers. To the fact I have to think him slightly incompetent. I mean the guy made it to be the head of a company, which means he likely isn't dumb. But I feel in his time at the top he forgot what got him there and felt that he was so smart he could do no wrong. Which is why he seemed to have such a hard time listening to his customer base, not reinvesting the right amount of money into a finished product, and not seeming to put much care in the company.

I wish him luck with his personal life and issues with the liztards that plague him. But there is plenty of people who have been hoping he would go for years. Perhaps someone with passion and a more customer orientated business plan will end up bringing DB out of the rather deep hole it found itself in among the online game community.

The new guy would actively have to TRY and hurt this game for it to be bad....Smed just seemed to treat this game like an obsessed ex-girl friend.

Some never forgave Smedley (and Julio Torres) for the SWG NGE fiasco.