Good Or Bad - "Ottoleaks"!

[bigvern]

http://forums.trainsim.com/vbts/showthr ... orks/page4

For those who haven't been following the thread directly, Page 4 reveals some rather interesting/worrying information about the financial status at RSC.

I'm not sure how much of that is current and it would be useful to have it re-verified, maybe things have rallied but being £300k in the hole is quite serious for a small company relying on a small portion of income from niche sales of DLC.

Let's hope it isn't actually that bad as, despite my love/hate relationship with Railworks, we are still as a hobby better off with it than without it.

Discuss...within the CoC of course.

[stephenholmes]

Thanks for posting this topic Vern
I am in favour of Company Accounts being in the public domain
There is nothing wrong with knowing how well or badly a Company is performing
Kind regards Stephen

[ightenhill]

Shows nothing other than Ottos frankly weird obsessions..

With no real shareholders other than the directors it would be common practice to move audit balance points about to suit tax purposes and to use certain years to write of assets (equipment, furniture and office costs - biscuits)..

However Otto the expert on all things wrote it so must be all be true

Other than that who cares.. MSTS seemed to manage after being abandoned by the developers in a few months

[pilot37]

You cannot look at a loss so simply. The business plan and cash flow going forward will tell a different story. The Balance sheet wasn't a disaster and the accounts are 9 month old history. The company is churning out new products at a good rate. The latest sale pack will be a push to improve the cash position I guess and there will be a gradual write off of intangible assets (probably intellectual property or goodwill) through amortisation?

If you are worried...buy some more add-ons I plan to because I am secretly addicted.

[smarty2]

Lets not forget the projections for next year are a profit, get rid of the doom and gloom and lets support them, I had no interest in the Doncaster works DLC but now have decided to purchase and other DLC I do not have; funds allowing, come on folks wheres the war spirit gone? support our RSC troops!!

[Easilyconfused]

The figures need to be taken in context and whilst they are in the public domain the celebratory tone of 2 posts was not warranted or helpful.

Please keep it on topic and within the bounds of the code of conduct and Matt's recent posting about forum behaviour.

Posts containing phrases like "I need to calm down" suggest you need to take a bracing walk in the crisp winter air before committing words to the forum. What is written in haste / stress / drunkeness / in a bad mood has a habit of coming back to bite you later.

[CaptScarlet]

Shows nothing other than Ottos frankly weird obsessions..

With no real shareholders other than the directors it would be common practice to move audit balance points about to suit tax purposes and to use certain years to write of assets..

However Otto the expert on all things wrote it so must be all be true

Other than that who cares.. MSTS seemed to manage after being abandoned by the developers in a few months

Yes, Otto has been on this obsession from when RS was first released, with his doom and gloom pronouncements on the demise of the project and company and yet they are still here even given the global financial crisis which has claimed much bigger organisations.

John

[bigvern]

MSTS seemed to manage after being abandoned by the developers in a few months

The difference there is that MSTS was a "fire and forget" product, RW is a slightly different beast in that ongoing support by the developers through Steam is pretty much essential pre-requisite - imagine if you came to reinstall and you suddenly had no access to the patches/updates and your DLC? I can only hope, as I mentioned on TS, that some sort of "bond" is paid to Steam by the publisher to provide ongoing support in the event of a company folding. After all, they are still selling RRT3 even though Poptop no longer exist (I think).

Anyhow before I'm accused of scaremongering or being vexatious, I should re-affirm that I posted this with the intention of having a mature, adult discussion about the financial realities of train simming. I must admit I was quite dismayed to see at how much of a loss catering for our hobby seems to run at. I guess it explains the resistance to putting older DLC (like IOW) into the core and the relatively high price of the add-ons which have been released. I actually want to approach this from the point of view of what can we, as a community, do to assist. Now obviously that doesn't mean donating money to RSC, they're not a charity and ultimately have to structure their business to make an operating surplus. Other than RW and its spin-offs, they may well have fingers in other pies the public don't know about. However, it might mean not putting off buying that bit of DLC you were looking at. For the route builder, incorporate assets from a payware route in your own freeware project (I guess that latter happens already). If you're a scenario creator, consider creating and making appealing activities with DLC stock/routes. Indirectly, it may go towards balancing the books.

[RSderek]

I knew I should not have put in the dev teams biscuit expenses for the year.



d

[smarty2]

Well, I have for a long time made scenarios with payware in but only received moans and groans for doing so, do you think this may change?

[smarty2]

I knew I should not have put in the dev teams biscuit expenses for the year.



d

You know what they say Derek, ignorance is bliss.

[crumplezone]

Looking at what Otto posted in the other forums and the link he provides to screenshots of the "official" documents its questionable weather they are completely legitimate or not. I also find it somewhat questionable after the recent BBC interview which aired on the side of positive as a company and the success of Railworks as a product, I wouldn't think they would want to go about giving a positive view of there company and products but be actually lying about it all under the woodwork, if anything that would cause a certain amount of negativity and in the current news environment not favourable.

Did not also RS.com just move recently to a new office complex earlier in the year also? You tend to not move to a new office if your finiacially in the red or not expecting a profit in my opinion.

The other thing to keep into consideration is as far as computer games and simulations go, alot of development costs and prolonged support after the project is complete generally don't turn a profit unless there big blockbuster titles like World of Warcraft, Call of Duty or other big brands, utter millions go into development so while the figures linked may sound scary I do not believe RS.com would be unexpected to see it. I also would think that if RS.com were suffering money issues they wouldn't be idling sitting about doing nothing and would be looking for other potential investors to help them keep running.

While also to note that we have had a slew of DLC released in the past year, I do not believe that is any indicator of money problems, more in lines that the code and ability for addon development has improved thus allowing for quicker turn arounds of projects, there has seemed to be far more 3rd party developers for Railworks than there was Railsimulator for example.

Either way I'm not to worried, I think Paul Jackson is a sensible person and knows what he's doing and is quite passionate about Railworks and trains, so push comes to shove he would find a way to keep things going.

[ianb1234674]

my reply was well in the rules all i im gonna say is I TOLD YOU ALL SO. then im no longer gonna have anything to do with ukts and railfailworks so im gonna leave ukts unistall railworks. but this is the last comment ever cause im very very very upset. ukts and railworks have made enemies out of me now (big mistake). farewell you will never see me again.

[nineercharlie]

But, on the other hand, an indication of financial stress in a business is usually manifested by having a sale.

[ightenhill]

MSTS seemed to manage after being abandoned by the developers in a few months

The difference there is that MSTS was a "fire and forget" product, RW is a slightly different beast in that ongoing support by the developers through Steam is pretty much essential pre-requisite - imagine if you came to reinstall and you suddenly had no access to the patches/updates and your DLC? I can only hope, as I mentioned on TS, that some sort of "bond" is paid to Steam by the publisher to provide ongoing support in the event of a company folding. After all, they are still selling RRT3 even though Poptop no longer exist (I think).

.

Theres no actual bond, its in simple terms just part of the contract of ownership between Steam and the original publisher. Steam itself though do have a policy to take effect should they themselves hit a problem which could cause there demise..

It does seem a rather odd point though. Are you saying its a disadvantage to still have a product that has ongoing support. Everything after the word imagine in your quote to be fair does hint a little of scaremongering.

The point they still sell a product from a closed software house is no different to buying a bargain bucket hard copy in a sale.. The full product with all the latest patches will be yours for that price and will remain on the server.. If you were an original user of RRT3 from launch day if steam didnt keep it on the server you couldnt delete it from one HDD and reinstall to your new PC etc