It's Not The End-Game, It's Just A Checkpoint Toy

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It's Not The End-Game, It's Just A Checkpoint Toy

Postby goofyspaceranger » Mon Aug 08, 2016 11:41 am

Most have understandably given up on the reboot attempts for Disney Infinity. Many held out until the Walt Disney Company released the official timetable of server shutdown. Some have expressed the opinion that with so many employees moving on to various other jobs, that the reboot is impossible. I do not share that opinion, and as long as the Sheriff allows for the creative license of these posts, I still have lots of ideas for said reboot, however unlikely it may be ;).

If fans wanted any hope in seeing new physical Disney Infinity figures, that hope for many months now rests in the hands of a new licenser. The Walt Disney Company was quite clear that it will not take on that direct financial risk again. The official website has <finally> issued a warning on the server shutdown and no longer even allows direct PC purchases. This is actually good news for a would-be licenser. There is a clear hand-off. There would be no liability for example, charging a subscription fee for content on the licenser's servers, as the Walt Disney Company now has set the boundaries. It's a little confusing that the servers are unavailable for PC & mobile by the end of September, yet available into March of next year for consoles, but that's helpful, too. There continues to be a degradation in rendered services (which began when vetting of new shared content stopped). The new licenser can be seen as the rescuer, the rebooter, while the Walt Disney Company can be seen as a benevolent IP holder facilitating that reboot at the request of the fans. The reboot has at least until March to copy over that shared content before the servers on the Disney side shut down, and ideally, would reboot as early as October to coincide with this timetable (e.g. on the console, continue accessing this old content for free until March, or begin a subscription fee with better organization & new content on this new provider's cloud).

For those who think that it's too late for the reboot due to the lost talent, I'll express my personal opinion as delicately as I can... we all wish the best for the entire Disney Infinity Team, not only for the what they created, but for their own personal work-life balance, and for those who have already found new work, we are happy for them. For those who haven't yet, we hope that a new licenser would give them the opportunity to continue their great work on this fantastic product; that could involve physically relocating to wherever that licenser is, and could entail very different work. It is the right thing to do, it is the most efficient thing to do, bringing in experienced, skilled talent from the marketing, to the artistry, to the programming of the product. But no one is irreplaceable. No one. That is a hard lesson learned from witnessing many, many resource actions. Everyone has immeasurable worth, but that worth is not defined by their current occupation, even their career. Comparison of contributions is inevitable for business but they are not necessarily indicative of the underlying starting points, work ethic, intentions - and an event as traumatic as an abrupt shutdown of entire facility challenges us to better understand that. That loss need not extend to the life cycle of what the team created, to so abruptly stop the service provided to millions of families. Marketing methods, artistic styles, the code base - they can all be researched, mimicked and extended. It's simply time & money. The focus must be on the product, the business plan, and the overall goal for extending both. Fans want servers online; fans want to share content again. And it's something that none of the other toys-to-life products provide at all.

However unlikely it is, it is still quite possible for Disney Infinity (& the Toy Box in particular) to be rebooted. It's not a question of where the product was three years ago. It's about where it is now. Consider the reboot as day 1. About a hundred Disney/Marvel/Star Wars characters. Thousands of virtual toys. Dozens upon dozens of shared Toy Boxes that can be organized & showcased better. Three years of marketing stats on what worked & what didn't work. A product focused on family, and on the creation & sharing of video games, not merely playing them. Go.
Use the Force in Holocron Heuristics to program with more Creativi-Toys!
 
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