Mainly, I’m sad about the fine folks at WP who lost their jobs. I’m concerned about Hiveswap, too, but not the way most of the fandom seems to be.

Just to be clear, I don’t have any special insight or anything. Everything I’m about to say is wildly speculatory, but well, so is pretty much all of the doomsaying already out here. I don’t really think all is lost, so if I can provide any comfort, I may as well offer my perspective.

Let’s break this down, because a lot of facts are getting mixed in with people making assumptions. Here’s what happened yesterday:

1) Cohen and Shelby tweeted that they were looking for work. That’s not an official statement on anything, but combined with WP’s branding being removed from the Hiveswap website and Poinko and James leaving, things certainly look bad for WP.

2) On the same day, VIZ launched the new version of the Homestuck website, with a redesign meant to render the comic more accessible–particularly for mobile users–and start future proofing the parts of the comic made on technology that is soon being rendered obsolete and largely unusable, like Flash.

These two things don’t seem innately related. Viz hasn’t done anything except update/future proof the website, which I already expected from the partnership. They also released a news post alluding to new stuff being on the way, which sounds like an update on the epilogue Hussie said he was working on with them. 

Even so, the overall look of the move has the fandom crying foul because they suspect VIZ is instigating some sort of corporate takeover. And while I think it’s good to be careful, I just don’t see the evidence for that yet.

I’m wary of corporate overlords, so I’ve sort of worried about VIZ along those lines before. And that is a risk I am continuing to look out for. But if I was worried about corporate censorship/manipulation of Homestuck, the only thing I’d immediately worry about is the LGBT stuff.

And for a corporation, Viz’s track record on LGBT stuff is fairly solid.
They’re in charge of re-dubbing the Sailor Moon anime, and have garnered positive press for NOT censoring the LGBT stuff the original dub did. They’ve published some LGBT manga. They’re not an LGBT corporation or anything, but their track record veers positive, is all I’m saying.

I can’t really think of what else they’d mess with. I’ve heard of them censoring religious imagery, and Homestuck does deal in some heavy spiritual/mythological themes, but I definitely wouldnt say anything in the comic is overtly religious.

More to the point, if they were going to mess with the actual comic, I don’t see why they wouldn’t have done so now, while they were doing the redesign. And while we’re at it, I should mention its questionable that VIZ actually has control over Homestuck’s actual IP.

The Homestuck website is copyrighted to Viz *and* Homestuck itself, which is the legal entity I’d expect holds all the actual creative rights. That probably wouldn’t matter if VIZ wanted to just strongarm Hussie with lawyers, though– billion dollar corporations are dangerous that way.

I’m just saying, I don’t know that having partial control of the site at all implies Hussie just “handed off” creative control to VIZ. That seems like a wild assumption.

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Also an assumption is the idea that VIZ “fired” WP so that they could develop the game themselves, which…I don’t really buy at all right now. Its not clear to me that VIZ has the expertise, manpower, or even interest in developing Hiveswap themselves.

Again, I am not claiming to have facts here. This is just an alternate line of fandom speculation. Please, for the love of fuck, don’t treat me like an expert. But here’s how things look from my perspective.

Because VIZ is largely a soulless corporation, the only motivation I can confidently ascribe to them is the one all companies have: making money.
And Hiveswap doesn’t exactly seem like it sold gangbusters, honestly.

@sometipsygnostalgic has noted how lackluster the advertising for the game was, and its true they seemed to be relying on word of mouth and hype to get the game sold. That doesn’t seem to have happened.

I find it hard to believe VIZ would watch this commercial flop unfold, and come out of it thinking its best move is to invest MORE money in the endeavor. Corporations don’t typically respond to market failure by doubling down on their investments, just in general.

But more to the point, I don’t see that VIZ has a clear route to do so.
The company only JUST involved itself in narrative driven indie games– and it’s involved itself as a publisher, NOT a developer. It partnered with two developers that we currently know of: 1) Rose City Games, the devs of The World Next Door, and until now, 2) What Pumpkin.

Rose City Games looks a lot like WP, staff-wise–it seems to be a small indie team of about a dozen and a half people, working on their first game. They’ve done some organizational work and stuff like that, but nothing that suggests to me that they’d be prepared or willing to just…take on Hiveswap in WP’s stead.

And there IS NO IN-HOUSE GAME DEV STUDIO at Viz. It doesn’t exist. Making Hiveswap themselves would mean building one, just like WP had to, and I don’t see why they’d want to take the risk with the less than promising results of Act 1.

While it’s possible this is some kind of takeover situation, that is a big IF to me right now. VIZ would be making some legit hard business decisions in pursuing that maneuver, and it’s not clear they’re going to. I think its at least as possible that development on the game is simply canceled, or ideally, frozen until there’s enough funds to actually pay people.

That last point is what I think fans should focus on. IF it’s a matter of simple lack of funs forcing What Pumpkin to close doors because there isn’t, uh, the money to friggin pay people, then…there’s probably hope.

Like I said, VIZ did just allude to more news coming. IF whatever they’re working on with Hussie is good/interesting enough to, say, get new people reading Homestuck, then all of a sudden the comic would be drawing new interest while also advertising to incoming readers about…Hiveswap, which is now advertised for on the web-site through pop up ads.

Kind of invasive? Sure. But word of mouth didn’t get the game sold, so if some old-fashioned advertising does and Hiveswap/Homestuck collectively start collecting enough hype and profit that the staff of WP can be rehired, I won’t complain.

All in all, I’ll just say we’ll have a much better idea of what this partnership between Hussie and VIZ looks like–and what VIZ’s intent is–once we see some actual content they’ve produced together. I suggest the fandom wait it out to see what this Epilogue is, and what kind of content might be coming after.

With any luck, that wait will only last until 4/13.