Pantheon Creative Director Says Using Volunteer Developers 'Not Completely Off The Table' To Help Speed Up MMO Development
mmorpg.comDuring the Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen community Q&A last night, Creative Director Chris «Joppa» Perkins was asked whether the studio would consider bringing on volunteer developers to help speed up the dev process. In answer, Perkins states that it is «something» the team is looking at.
Pantheon's developer Visionary Realms hosted a community Q&A last night to help clear the air surrounding the MMO after the reports that the team was working on a spin-off extraction game mode, dubbed «24/7,» to help support the development process. VR has justified the new mode under alpha testing as a way to help speed up and contribute to the development of the MMO itself.
However, the topic of speeding up development was something that was touched on multiple times during the Q&A with one viewer asking whether or not Visionary Realms would consider opening development to volunteers from the community. Historically, for Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen, the idea of using volunteer workers to build the MMO is nothing new. Back in 2014, following the initial failed Kickstarter campaign, Visionary Realms founder Brad McQuaid openly discussed the studio using volunteers at the outset to build Pantheon.
Fast-forward to now, and it looks like that might be a potential source of development, though there are legal obstacles to consider, according to Joppa.
«There are certain legal complications that can come from working with volunteers,» Perkins began in answer to the question. He continued, «And I say that as someone [who] volunteered on this project for the first year and a half for free.»
Perkins admitted then that he is currently the only full-time designer on Pantheon's development team, the rest working part-time, though Perkins goes on to
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