Konami & Skullgirls

[VolnuttHeroP64]

Did Konami have a hand in Making the Arcade Version of Skullgirls? They're famous for the Gradius Series. And how come their logo doesn't appear at the start of the game?

[VolnuttHeroP64]

Originally posted by node357:

probably because they're not involved, which is a good thing. they are not the benevolent gradius makers anymore. come to think of it, most of their coin-op games were unreasonably hard.

Gradius 1-4 only cost 25-50 cents per game. While the SNES Version of contain 4 Credits per game. And how much did the Japanese Cabinet Version of Skullgirls cost per game? 75 Cents to $1?

[VolnuttHeroP64]

Originally posted by node357:

what i really meant is Konami as a company has gone downhill ethically. my personal experience with their treatment of the Silent Hill series, as well as what i've heard about their abuse of Lab Zero makes me think this way.

Then Who owns Konami?

[Goose]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bgag0b4CIAAm1kx.jpg Whoever the two logos on the bottom are on a newish taito cabinet would be the people you are looking for.

[VolnuttHeroP64]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skullgirls

Then why does the article of Wikipedia has Konami listed on the Publishers tab of Skullgirls?

[CarThief]

Well i dont know too much of the details but the latest version(s) of Skullgirls called Skullgirls Encore are no longer involved with Konami, due to some issues and Konami being aparrantly unwilling to cooperate in various ways, or something.

So i think it went like this, they went and used Kickstarter to make a Konami-unrelated PC version and eventually updated the console versions (or are going to) to also be Konami-unrelated. Or maybe they didnt need Kickstarter for that specifically and just purely to make the PC version... Or whatever crowdfunding site they where using, meh, thats the best i can remember.

Either way, Konami is no longer related to this game in particular, atleast the PC version, i think by now they updated the console versions to be the Encore version too, or soon enough. Cant tell given how slow console updates tend to be.

Meh, i wont be suprised if i'm horribily inaccurate on when Konami was no longer involved anymore, by all means feel free to correct me on that.

[VolnuttHeroP64]

Originally posted by CarThief:

Well i dont know too much of the details but the latest version(s) of Skullgirls called Skullgirls Encore are no longer involved with Konami, due to some issues and Konami being aparrantly unwilling to cooperate in various ways, or something.

So i think it went like this, they went and used Kickstarter to make a Konami-unrelated PC version and eventually updated the console versions (or are going to) to also be Konami-unrelated. Or maybe they didnt need Kickstarter for that specifically and just purely to make the PC version... Or whatever crowdfunding site they where using, meh, thats the best i can remember.

Either way, Konami is no longer related to this game in particular, atleast the PC version, i think by now they updated the console versions to be the Encore version too, or soon enough. Cant tell given how slow console updates tend to be.

Meh, i wont be suprised if i'm horribily inaccurate on when Konami was no longer involved anymore, by all means feel free to correct me on that.

Skullgirls Encore contains bug-fixes

[CarThief]

Well... Yeah, i know that much, bug fixes, rebalancing and such from the beta, Big Band at some point. AKA the updated version, not entirely sure how that's relevant, though.
I was mostly mentioning the status of Konami's involvement.

But i suppose i did forget to mention it also came with some updates and changes.

[JasonS]

Origionally, Konami needed to be signed onto the game in order for the game to be published on XBox 360 because of Microsoft's abusive anti-indie dev policies. They had nothing to do with the game other than some bug testing and rubber-stamping the game to be released on XBox.

Here's a short rundown of some of the stuff that has gone wrong with the game because of Konami

#1 - The publisher who funded the first 8 characters, Autumn Games, also worked with Konami to make DefJam rapstar. Konami took out a 13 million dollar loan to fund the project which they neglected to pay back when the game flopped, causing the bank to sue Konami and Autumn. Autumn was eventually found innocent of any wrong doing but the protracted lawsuit caused Autumn to lose the ability to get further funding for their other games. The end result was that the Lab Zero team ended up needing to work unpaid for several months before the game was released, and then were laid off. The game was trapped in limbo with no updates for over a year as a result.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/117413-Konami-Faces-Another-Def-Jam-Rapstar-Lawsuit

With no hope of reciving any funding from Autumn until the lawsuit was finished, Autumn gave Lab Zero permission to fund further content for the game via Croud Funding on Indie Go Go, which was a huge sucess and raised $829,000 resulting in 5 new characters being funded.

#2 - Konami repeatedly failed to properly bugtest the builds of the game that Lab Zero were submitting to them, a service that Lab Zero was paying them money for. This resulted in a series of delays for the first XBox 360 patch, leading to several months of extra delays in getting the patch to 360 after it had already been on PS3 for quite a while. (This is not the only reason that the 360 patch was late but it added to the burden)

#3 - When Konami finally concluded their lawsuit with the bank and Autumn, they decided to break off all contact with Autumn Games and Lab Zero. They requested that the game be pulled from the XBLA and PSN stores, without notifying Lab Zero, or Autumn. Lab Zero was only informed of this less than a month before the game was slated to be removed by Sony. This resulted in several months of the games being unavailable for purchase on XBLA and PSN before they were finally re-released as the Encore version on PS3 with Konami's name taken off of the game. The 360 version is still unavailable due to Konami draging their heels in the legal process of getting the 360 version reassigned to be published under "Marvelous!", the publisher who funded the PC port.