Project Zomboid Derailed By Burglary

[The Wooster]

Project Zomboid Derailed By Burglary

Project Zomboid developer, The Indie Stone has been screwed by fate - and the criminal element - yet again. A break-in at the company's UK studio has claimed two laptops, and the majority of the Project Zomboid code.

I consider myself a scientific man, one not prone to blaming the supernatural for life's many hiccups, but at this point I think it's fair to say that the indie developers behind the excellent zombie-apocalypse-survival-simulator Project Zomboid [http://projectzomboid.com/blog/] are, in fact, cursed.

First, the project had to be taken offline for a brief period after pirates started stealing the game directly from the game servers [http://www.destructoid.com/project-zomboid-taken-offline-due-to-piracy-204071.phtml], using bandwidth the developer had to pay for. Then Paypal decided to lock the company's account for some cryptic reason [http://kotaku.com/5848062/frozen-account-further-sours-paypals-terrible-reputation-with-indie-devs], cutting off the company's sole source of income for an outrageous 180 days. Now a break-in at its Newcastle upon Tyne studio has claimed two laptops used to develop the game, forcing the developer to revert to out-of-date backups. Very out-of-date backups.

The Indie Stone's initial response was not optimistic: "We're fucked basically," wrote developer Chris "Lemmy" Simpson on his now closed Twitter feed. "We still have code but it's basically before the last update. This will probably finish us. Sorry [sic] let everyone down."

Apparently, The Indie Stone has been somewhat lax when it comes to backing up its data offsite. "I expect I'll either get a lot of disbelief or a lot of flak for no regular offsite backup," wrote Simpson. "I deserve both."

Now that the developers have had some time to compose themselves, and presumably scream at the sky for a bit about how unfair the universe is, they've promised that Project Zomboid will "come back stronger."

"In the cold light of day Project Zomboid is not 'fucked', no-one has been run over by a bus-we've simply been knocked back a few steps. With the support of the community we will get our groove back," The Indie Stone's Will Porter told Kotaku. [http://kotaku.com/5850245/burglary-delivers-huge-setback-to-indie-game-project-zomboid] He also added that no personal information about Project Zomboid's players, who have paid for the final version of the game in advance, was compromised.

"This will clearly severely delay the next update, which was very near completion," said Porter. "During this time we will clearly be asking for the understanding and patience of our community. We are gutted, we are despondent and - most of all - we are sorry that this has thrown yet another bump into the road towards PZ completion."

"We also REALLY want to wring the neck of the arsehole that did this to us," he added.

Source: Kotaku [http://kotaku.com/5850245/burglary-delivers-huge-setback-to-indie-game-project-zomboid]


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[Raddra]

I also want to wring the neck of the chav scum that did this.

 

[hannan4mitch]

Wow, some people just have the shittiest luck.

 

[KennardKId5]

/facepalm
Wow. That's...that's terrible. What genius...wow. Not to mention all of those months of work will go down the drain when those damn burglars pirate stuff and delete all the code to make room for some terrible action movie.

 

[ramboondiea]

.......i think im going to get a priest in to bless my computer because i suddenly dont trust that zomboid demo what if its like the ring and bad shit is just going to start happening?

 

[theonecookie]

And this kiddys is what happens when you don't back up your fucking code seriously how people are smart enough to code videogames not to back it is beyond me

anyway if anything this will be a learning experience for the dev

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

Unless those laptops are brought back, and it isn't being torrented as we speak, I don't know how they will be able to bounce back after losing what must of been hundreds of hours of work gone.

 

[Giest4life]

The criminals should keep the laptops, but we really should petition them to return the code at least. Because it's not like they can sell it and make a profit out of it---which they could, by trying to hold it for ransom.

 

[bbad89]

The criminals should keep the laptops, but we really should petition them to return the code at least. Because it's not like they can sell it and make a profit out of it---which they could, by trying to hold it for ransom.

They should keep the laptops....what?

 

[The Wooster]

The criminals should keep the laptops, but we really should petition them to return the code at least. Because it's not like they can sell it and make a profit out of it---which they could, by trying to hold it for ransom.

They should keep the laptops....what?

It's not entirely unheard of. [http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/considerate_laptop_thief_returns_victims_data_usb_key] But this is Newcastle we're talking about, if the thief accidentally turned the PC on he'd probably start worshiping it as a god.

 

[Epitome]

Would happen a week after I buy the thing :/ Still I feel bad for them, it was careless not to make backups of the code for whatever reason, but they don't deserve all this bad luck.

I wonder if the thieves even know what they have done, or will they just pull the hard drives without a care for all the work that's on them. If they had any decency they would return the hard drives at least.

 

[Thumper17]

If they were lap tops, why not just bring them home?

 

[Aenir]

If they were lap tops, why not just bring them home?

The laptops -were- at home. Their home was broken into, they're indie devs, they don't have an office.

All the shit people are giving them on reddit and twitter is disgusting, their just had their home violated and thousands of dollars of personal belongings stolen, and then they have idiots on the internet giving them crap.

 

[oldtaku]

These guys aren't cursed, they're just really incompetent.

 

[Wieke]

If I was working on a game I would use offsite backups. Services like SkyDrive and iCloud spring readily to mind if a dedicated offsite backup is not affordable or otherwise inconvenient. This cloud-based backup is NOT there just for show!

Seriously: I am almost feeling like doing a classic "HA-HA" towards them for storing their ENTIRE code-base for the update on two objects designed to be mobile and therefore inherently easy to steal and NOT MAKING BACKUPS! Anyone who does serious work of any sort with a computer should learn the I.T mantra: "If you do something, back it up. If you save something, back it up, if you delete anything and cannot recover it you should have backed it up. If you lose something and cannot get it back, you should have backed it up!" It is almost physically painful (Well, it is from the resulting facepalm) when people forget to back up valuable data!

Indeed, this is what you get for not making any backups.

Apparently, The Indie Stone has been somewhat lax when it comes to backing up their data offsite. "I expect I'll either get a lot of disbelief or a lot of flak for no regular offsite backup," wrote Simpson. "I deserve both."

At least they recognize and admit that it's partly of their own doing. Not saying they deserved to get their stuff nicked, but they could (and should) have taken precautions. Any number of events could have led to this loss of data, not just event requiring malevolent intentions (i'm thinking accidents, hardware failure and the like).

 

[samsonguy920]

There is stealing someone's TV, and there is taking their money. But something they put hard months into? I would say the fairest exchange is burning the homes of the thieves down, but one wonders if they have anything of true value to them.
Here's hoping something good turns up in all of this.

The criminals should keep the laptops, but we really should petition them to return the code at least. Because it's not like they can sell it and make a profit out of it---which they could, by trying to hold it for ransom.

They should keep the laptops....what?

It's not entirely unheard of. [http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/considerate_laptop_thief_returns_victims_data_usb_key] But this is Newcastle we're talking about, if the thief accidentally turned the PC on he'd probably start worshiping it as a god.

It's akin to when someone gets their wallet or purse stolen. Usually they could care less about the cash, but everything else getting returned that is more important to the person is preferred.

If they were lap tops, why not just bring them home?

The laptops -were- at home. Their home was broken into, they're indie devs, they don't have an office.

All the shit people are giving them on reddit and twitter is disgusting, their just had their home violated and thousands of dollars of personal belongings stolen, and then they have idiots on the internet giving them crap.

Like this fellow? vv

These guys aren't cursed, they're just really incompetent.

It is easy to say that, when you don't know all that the guys have gone through. When you are dealing with high stress days, don't you forget to do something important now and then? Don't say you don't. And if you never had high stress days, then you really don't have a place to speak.

 

[CardinalPiggles]

I also want to wring the neck of the chav scum that did this.

And every chav scumbag in the entire country. They are a plague that needs some very strong recourse.

Sucks to be a PZ developer I guess. But they should have backed up their files a bit better. Everything on one or two laptops? that's a bit careless.

 

[Craorach]

I've said it elsewhere, I'll say it here... this is a terrible thing to happen to anyone, my heart goes out to them and I hope they manage to sort themselves out and recover, both from a business perspective and personally.

However, EVERY business, no matter how small, needs to insure itself against loss like this by keeping its records off site. Every business also needs to accept that if they do not, customers may become angry, and that is what every person who paid them money for preorders are, customers.

The lack of backups is a mistake, but this company really needs to get its shit together and sort out it's problems both in that regard, and in its communication with its customers, after the drunken rage filled rants on twitter in response to some unpleasant comments.

 

[mrwoo6]

It is easy to say that, when you don't know all that the guys have gone through. When you are dealing with high stress days, don't you forget to do something important now and then? Don't say you don't. And if you never had high stress days, then you really don't have a place to speak.

Stress is irreverent, they run a business and they have many paying customers whom have only "bought" the game on the promise that they get a full version of the game at some point. THIS is the reason Paypal did what they did, THIS proves that Paypal was completely just in what they did because they can't promise to deliver this game. If they did say that the game was "fucked" I damn well would be asking for my money back.

There are very unlucky, and I do feel sympathetic for them, but they were payed to do a job and they aren't doing it to the best of there ability's. Having backups of the most important vital documents and files in their company is basic, basic stuff. If I lose important documents because my I only kept it on one USB, do you think my boss will let me off because I was stressed? no, he'd fire me on the spot.