Status Quo Team Gizka.

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 4:12 am

No Release Date Questions Allowed.

The main question here is: How is the Gizka doing?

Team Gizka's status reports stopped coming in regularly a few years ago and since then we have just their and Lucas Art's forums plus their Mantis project management tool to rely on. Due to zoo-control issues, asking progress related questions on the forums will get your threads locked in no time and the latter project tool is really no indication at all, since it is once again way up over a thousand bugs.

The biggest problem is that the information is scattered around across at least two entire forums. I want to round up some of the rumors/facts we've all heard.

Last year the project was leaked and it was decided to halt the public beta, resulting in delays.
The big chief Dashus has left the project little over a year ago due to events in his private life taking precedence. Unknown whether this is permanent.
According to Mantis, no bugs have been fixed in over seven months.

That's all I know. Add things you've heard and correct what you see in this thread, please. Let's see if we can round up some facts.

Note: The recently released video, while produced nicely, was an april fools joke.

koz-ivan · Post by **koz-ivan** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 7:30 am

lol.

i too have been awaiting their restoration project, i figured after i slipped away from my 2 year wow phase, maybe there would be something... no such luck.

that being said, where does the above text come from? i don't see it on their site?

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 8:40 am

"oh my god what did he write this time - let's all gather around and try to figure out what it was"

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 12:54 pm

I've been following the project and occasionally lurking at the project's forum for a few years now. To me, at least, it seems like the project has been mostly halted and (in my opinion) it's probably close to being vaporware. Of course, such a suggestion would likely get you ridiculed and possibly banned from the project's forums, which is a reason why I never joined.

As far as I know, the beta was a private affair and after it was leaked, they had to scale back the amount of people testing. They're admirably committed to fixing EVERY bug before release, which is likely why it's becoming likely it won't be released since the beta testing started over a year ago. I fully respect the fact that the team does it on their free time and have other commitments, but they don't seem to be replacing team members that they've lost with new blood.

The project, by all accounts, is awesome, and I sincerely wish it would be released. That said, I'll honestly be surprised if it ever is.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Thu Jul 09, 2009 10:32 am

After doing some more poking around, both the bug tracker on the project website and Mantis itself are very out of date, since they essentially stopped being used. The "team" is mostly just one person now that has no time to work on the mod because of real life commitments. The fact that the team has been very reduced in size is the reason that the public bug trackers aren't being used, as testers are reporting them right to the team. Most of the team don't post on the project forums anymore either, so the real status is completely unknown.

Add that to the fact that the existing team, beta testers, and most of the core TSLRP community are all very opposed to releasing it open source or expanding the team leads me to believe that it's certainly close to being qualified as vaporware, from my point of view.

By all accounts, the mod is exceptional, and all that remains is bug testing and fixing. It's unfortunate that the project has seemingly stalled at such a late stage in development.

koz-ivan · Post by **koz-ivan** » Thu Jul 09, 2009 2:41 pm

Nightmare wrote:Add that to the fact that the existing team, beta testers, and most of the core TSLRP community are all very opposed to releasing it open source or expanding the team leads me to believe that it's certainly close to being qualified as vaporware, from my point of view.

that's the part i've not been able to understand, if it's that close why they can't finish it, or just release it warts and all. they seem to have a devoted following that just wants to see it play out.

alternately, if they know it isn't going to happen "jokes" the the april fool's trailer is really a pretty dumb move. (stronger language would normally be used here, but this is a family forum)

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 2:17 am

Yup, there is no team. It's just Dashus sitting on a bunch of code and forum moderators protecting him by closing down threads that are on topic. The only remaining topic being of course the progress of the mod. He admitted not having worked on the mod in some time. A clever poster simply asked the remaining purpose of the forum, whether it shoudn't just be closed down. Their response? A moderator locked down the thread. Very helpful.

Anyway, there have been some new developments. It's really hard to make out what's going on since it's all just scattered replies and threads on the forum. No single news posts or status updates. Dashus paid the forum a visit and said that he will continue to work on it alone till kingdom come, but also that he released some beta version for people to work on. Even though that's nowhere to be found. That's all I've been able to make out. I can't tell who or when.

They could solve so many of their problems just by making some kind definitive statement on their main site. It's like they forgot about about the site, their lives somehow being wrapped up around that little forum.

galraen · Post by **galraen** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 6:25 am

I came to the conclusion that it's the longest running April Fools joke in history. Either that or a fake project launched by Lucas Arts or Obsidian to dissuade real modders from starting their own restoration project for some reason. My money's on the whole thing being a hoax myself.

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 6:40 am

The thought occured to me before, but it's real. During the time Dashus still had little helpers, the code got leaked. That was the cue for him to let go of his beta staff and work the thing himself. There were some issues later on with people wanting to use the code for their own mods. Basically your standard badly moderated forum drama.

Loki[D.d.G] · Post by **Loki[D.d.G]** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 10:57 am

Tricky wrote:The thought occured to me before, but it's real.

My money is on this thing not appearing for at least another decade.

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 11:24 am

Hehe, yes. Considering Dashus' last statements I think it will be plural years at least. A shame though.

A few other Kotor 2 fix mods have sprung up to restore content untouched by Team (Person) Gizka, such as the Peragus Minings facility, and much faster than they ever did. These left room for Team Gizka's work and made frequent mention of future compatibility between their own mod and TSLRP.

Since there are obviously so many qualified modders around now, what I'd really like to know is who will continue on the TSLRP code that has been made public. It's the one thing where we can expect good progress on now.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 9:11 pm

Beyond the lack of progress on the mod, the real problem that TG has always had is actually communicating with their community, especially when most of the team slowly left and Dashus had RL issues which preventing him from working on it. Simply having real, updating progress reports would have helped tremendously.

Frankly, I come from the side that wants them to just release it is as is, open source, and let the community finish it. Because, as much kudos as Dashus and the TG team deserve for the work on it, simply not releasing it ever (which is frankly what happens if Dashus is doing it all himself) isn't the way to go.

I've essentially decided that its vaporware, and I'll be surprised if it ever comes out. I really wish it would, since I enjoy KotOR 2 immensely, but...

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 11:52 pm

Nightmare wrote:Frankly, I come from the side that wants them to just release it is as is, open source, and let the community finish it. Because, as much kudos as Dashus and the TG team deserve for the work on it, simply not releasing it ever (which is frankly what happens if Dashus is doing it all himself) isn't the way to go.

As I was saying, from what I've been able to gather from the forum, this has happened and is the only thing warranting renewed interest in the mod. It's only really unclear to figure out by forums alone (and one strewn with locked topics at that) who is going to pick it up.

Tricky · Post by **Tricky** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 10:17 am

Someone nicknamed DStoney will be releasing an alpha to his own content restoration project this month. Still reading up about the exact contents on their forum (yay.)

TSL Restored Content Mod - Deadly Forums

[QUOTE=Lord of Hunger @ Deadlystream forums]I'll list the differences (between DStoney's mod TSLRCM and Team Gizka's TSLRP):

-Cut Content: TSLRCM will have more cut content in general. Stuff like Atris as Traya, Selling Vrook into slavery, and Dustil Onasi will be left out because there is no enough material and they don't make sense anyway, however they are also things you won't find in TSLRP either. The only piece of cut content TSLRP will have that TSLRCM will not have is the GenoHaradan, which is being restored and expanded upon in a separate mod that can be used in conjunction with TSLRCM. It is not being restored with TSLRCM because the only way to really integrate it into the game without expanding it is TSLRP's way, and the way they do it makes little sense.

-Bug Fixing: The Distinguished Opposition (Team Gizka) claims that they are fixing every single bug in the game. In addition to slowing down their progress, this has served to only create more bugs. TSLRCM has fixed pretty much every major ingame bug from the unmodded version of TSL, as well as plenty of smaller bugs too. However, we are not fixing every single small bug such as awkward camera angles and grammar errors that were there to begin with because that is not what we are setting out to do. This is a TSL Restored Content Mod, not a TSL Perfection Mod. However, unlike The Distinguished Opposition and TSLRP, we plan on offering continuous support for TSLRCM after the release, so patches with bug fixes are perfectly possible.

-High Quality: As I said above, TSLRCM is not a mod designed to make TSL perfect like TSLRP aims to do. We really don't have the time or patience to rebuild the entire game, which is probably why TSLRP has slowed down so much. We can improve things after the release if requested, or support mods that do that. Granted, we don't have the new lean animation or the camera angles or whatnot. What we are offering to the community is to have TSLRCM done now and if necessary improve other aspects of the game later.
[/QUOTE]

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 12:33 pm

Looks pretty good, I'll check out the forums.