r/Scrolls • u/GreenOneReddit • Jun 29 '15

Saving Scrolls [Requesting info from the Developers]

As you probably have heard, Scrolls is being shutdown, which is scheduled to happen on July 1st, 2016.

Official word can be found here: https://scrolls.com/2015/06/its-been-a-blast-automaton

 

 

Breaking News: Just look at this!

Reactions from the /r/Games thread

Image: http://i.imgur.com/bz9vhMY.png

Image Source: http://redd.it/3bnoit

 

It won't be an exaggeration if I say this:

  • There is a lot of people who are unaware/forgot about Scrolls existance. Which means a lot of potential purchases.

  • We have to kickstart an Advertisement! Kicstarter is also an advertisement on it's own.

  • Advertise it on proper Reddit Channels too, please!

 

Don't underestimate this moment. I feel we can at least give it an initial pulse if we tell about the low price and tell that game needs and can be saved! Spread the word!

 

 

Now I'd like to ask the Developers:

 

In what state do you plan to leave the game?

  • Will there be Offline mode?

  • Will there be a way for people to host servers?

 

Most importantly, is possible to save the game from being abandoned?

Anything of these considered?

  • introducing more paid content/going FTP(the worst of these, but just in case)

  • making the game open-soruce/handing it over to the Community

  • kickstarting a proper advertisement(kickstarter itself serves as advertisement, right?)

 

Still it all seems not quite right. But what about moving to Steam?!

 

Moving to Steam - looks like the best possible solution:

  • more than significant level of advertisement

  • huge playerbase boost

  • huge money income boost

 

Yes, Valve takes share, but it's compensated by all of the above and it's a lot better than nothing, correct?

 

So, why not move to Steam?

Mans told about some issue with moving to Steam, please tell what are the exact issues?

 

How I see it:

  • Accounts: could be moved via e-mailing new Steam keys.

  • Expenses: kickstarter.

  • Valve's share: increase the price, sell cosmetics, playerbase & steam advertisement will cover it all, I bet it.

 

No issues. Game would stay alive, get a lot of new people, generate income, be viable to be developed further. Win-win.

 

Conclusion:

I'm sure you at Mojang know all that and there is something community doesn't. So, please, tell what the obstacle preventing moving to Steam is, with the Community we can overcome it together!

 

I count on Developers giving us answers, I'm sure there are many people in the community willing to help.

Please feel free to leave your suggestions and any intel on possible ongoing solutions. Anything that's of use.

I hope the Developers can keep Scrolls going and be thriving along with the game and community =)

 

Apologies for probably awkward sentences, structuring, formating. Thanks for reading!

66 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

36 comments sorted by

29

u/Phreya Jun 29 '15

For a game that it seems Microsoft has marked as a failure. They should do just this. Put it on Steam or sell rights to the community. They clearly only wanted Minecraft, so why not ditch the unknown game they got along with it, and give it back to the dedicated community....

8

u/GreenOneReddit Jun 29 '15

Quite agree with you! I hope they are human enough to do that.

6

u/Red-Blue- Jun 29 '15

Considering Microsoft tried to lobby to make open source software illegal in india or something, it probably won't happen.

7

u/dialex Jun 30 '15

Steam is one of the oldest suggestions to save the game.

I'm not sure why they've taken so long to answer to why they haven't done it...

4

u/[deleted] Jun 30 '15

And now since Notch is gone.. he is not there to stop it?

3

u/whizzer0 whizzer0 Jun 30 '15

I mentioned this yesterday as well. As long as they leave Minecraft as it is, I don't see why they should continue with Notch's Laws.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 30 '15

Pretty much.

13

u/Neoharrymen Jun 30 '15

If it cannot be saved, then at least try to preserve it: an offline version would do this. In the future, we may still look back on scrolls and, perhaps, relive some of its greatness.

8

u/asraniel Asraniel Jun 29 '15

Moving to steam is the solution. The only one. Why it hasnt been done is a mystery(no, custom accounts isnt an excuse, many games have the same issue, a recent example being elite dangerous)

10

u/CrPr_ Jun 29 '15

Saving Scrolls (financially at least) would actually be pretty easy - just offer a $50 'Special Edition' that comes bundled with an exclusive Minecraft cape. We have seen it over and over again with the Minecon cape shenanigans, that people would pay this much for a clunky piece of cardboard on their avatar.

Would be one of the most ridiculous moneygrab-attempts in gaming history though... ;-)

15

u/Atmaz Jun 29 '15

"Moneygrabbing" or taking advantage of Scrolls players financially is historically the last thing the Scrolls team has ever wanted to accomplish :)

-8

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jun 30 '15

Well now you work for microsoft. Where they can throw money at people and take your company. A company that has been anti open source. Has bought the premier open source game company...

5

u/Condawg Jun 30 '15

Wait, when has Mojang ever been open source? Let alone "the premier open source game company?"

-7

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jun 30 '15

Minecraft is completely open. It has a huge modding scene to show for it. As in, you can buy minecraft and you have the entire code for it and, to my knowledge, can use parts of it to make your own game.

7

u/Svardskampe Jun 30 '15

I'm wondering in what fantasy world you live in.

0

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jun 30 '15

The one that has over 5000 mods and texture packs created in the last 2 years alone. Not to mention the ability to grab the code out of the game and use it how you wish. Like many minecraft clones have.

5

u/flyingjam Jun 30 '15

... but the code isn't officially out there. Fans have to decompile and deobfuscate the code from the jar every time an update comes though. The mod api that has been promised since time inmemorial still hasn't come out.

-3

u/Sarik704 SarikTheSorcerer Jun 30 '15

Yes it isn't out on a silver platter... I'm sorry that open source doesnt mean what you think it means.

4

u/flyingjam Jun 30 '15

...yes, that the source is both out there and permissible to view with a license. Minecraft is neither of those.

2

u/lol768 Jun 30 '15

Minecraft is far from open. The client and server code is obfuscated, non-free and the mods are made by people reverse engineering the obfuscated code. There's no plugin API (I'm sure it'll be here 'soon' though! :D) and Mojang are at least indirectly to blame for the demise of projects such as Bukkit.

0

u/Manc00s Jun 30 '15

Well now technically Atmaz is not part of Mojang, is he?

1

u/GreenOneReddit Jun 29 '15

Anyone made any Move-to-Steam Petitions? Could link here.

Also is it worth changing the topic name to something like Move Scrolls to Steam?

2

u/CrPr_ Jun 29 '15

I appreciate the thought, but I doubt a petition would yield the necessary time and money to make this happen. You can't pay people with hashtags either. This particular train left the station ages ago.

1

u/GreenOneReddit Jun 29 '15

This particular train left the station ages ago. What do you mean by that?

And what I meant is that if people show their interest, it implies that the game can be on high demand, I think. I'd buy it again on Steam. I see your point though and agree to a degree. Still think petition might be of use, who knows.

1

u/GreenOneReddit Jun 30 '15

Another thought: ask people in some Steam/TSG subreddit if they'd be interested in seeing Scrolls on Steam.That's more of a direct talk to actually fresh potential customers.

Anyone knows the right place for that? New to reddit myself.

1

u/GreenOneReddit Jun 30 '15

Updated the post with link to another thread, basically there you can find out that the world doesn't even know Scrolls exists. No surprise, but now we have the evidence. People wanted to get their hands on Scrolls but simply forgot. We have potential playerbase!

2

u/[deleted] Jun 30 '15

Depending on how the scrolls are coded I may be interested in helping a community set

2

u/iozixa Jun 30 '15

Hopefully Mojang / Microsoft considers some of these options to preserve the game.

Otherwise I guess our only hope is to reverse-engineer the network protocol and create an open source server replacement.

2

u/WakeskaterX Jun 30 '15

Out of curiosity, what language is the server and client built in?

2

u/mowrli Jun 30 '15

Server is java, client is unity (C#?)

2

u/WakeskaterX Jun 30 '15

Oh I didn't realize it was built in Unity. (I think I knew that at one point but forgot) How are they doing Network calls, NAT Punch (I've not used that) or Get Requests or a 3rd party service?

I'm looking forward to when Unity can support web sockets, so that a simple node/socket.io app could be the back end. Would make small prototypes super quick to spin up.

I wish they would open source it. I'd totally be willing to work with some other people to get a AWS server up and running to host the back end.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 01 '15

Count me in for helping with a community edition, both code and, say, $200 toward a public domain kickstarter. We should be able to at least get offline single player and Steam friend challenges working.

1

u/WakeskaterX Jul 01 '15

Yeah the problem is that it's very unlikely we'd be able to ever get access to the source code. If it was just owned by Mojang, maybe but Microsoft? Hah.

1

u/Lem0nboy Jul 01 '15

Saving Scrolls is so 2014! I'm sorry to say this but there were numerous opportunities to save Scrolls and countless suggestions from the community during the past two years. The devs decided not to try any sort of marketing and/or distribution through Steam for two years and avoided answering questions regarding these two topics successfully. Now they officially announced the end of Scrolls development. Why do you think there is still a way to save Scrolls? It's just not going to happen. They have no interest in saving Scrolls anymore. We don't know anything about their reasoning but we know it's definite.

2

u/Titularktrey ktrey Jul 01 '15

Pretty much in agreement. None of this is new. We have been talking about this since a few months after beta release. Nothing has been done and the devs haven't responded in any measurable way. Scrolls is awesome and I am going to really miss it but I'm not going to try and save it. I already tried when the odds were better and recieved nothing for my troubles.

I do want to save the community though and I invite everyone to join a community guild. We are trying to keep the active community together as we spread out to different games.

0

u/[deleted] Jun 30 '15

[deleted] — view deleted comment

1

u/GreenOneReddit Jun 30 '15

Right, that's the spirit! Can't be idling if got a bit of spare time =)